What makes an iris scan unique?
The iris is the colored ring of muscle that opens and shuts the pupil of the eye like a camera shutter. The colored pattern of our irises is determined genetically when we're in the womb but not fully formed until we're aged about two. It comes from a pigment called melanin—more melanin gives you browner eyes and less produces bluer eyes. Although we talk about people having "blue eyes," "green eyes," "brown eyes," or whatever, in reality the color and pattern of people's eyes is extremely complex and completely unique: the patterns of one person's two eyes are quite different from each other and even genetically identical twins have different iris patterns.
How does iris scanning work in practice?
To get past an iris-scanning system, the unique pattern of your eye has to be recognized so you can be positively identified. That means there have to be two distinct stages involved in iris-scanning: enrollment (the first time you use the system, when it learns to recognize you) and verification/recognition (where you're checked on subsequent occasions).
Enrollment
First, all the people the system needs to know about have to have their eyes scanned. This one-off process is called enrollment. Each person stands in front of a camera and has their eyes digitally photographed with both ordinary light and invisible infrared (a type of light used in night vision systems that has a slightly longer wavelength than ordinary red light). In iris recognition, infrared helps to show up the unique features of darkly colored eyes that do not stand out clearly in ordinary light. These two digital photographs are then analyzed by a computer that removes unnecessary details (such as eyelashes) and identifies around 240 unique features (about five times more "points of comparison" as fingerprint systems use). These features, unique to every eye, are turned into a simple, 512-digit number called an IrisCode® that is stored, alongside your name and other details, in a computer database. The enrollment process is completely automatic and usually takes no more than a couple of minutes.
Verification
Once you're stored in the system, it's a simple matter to check your identify. You simply stand in front of another iris scanner and have your eye photographed again. The system quickly processes the image and extracts your IrisCode®, before comparing it against the hundreds, thousands, or millions stored in its database. If your code matches one of the stored ones, you're positively identified; if not, tough luck! It either means you're not known to the system or you're not whom you claim to be.