Abstract : Our daily interactions are based on recognizing people. As information technology advances, our interactions will be accomplished through newly designed interfaces, with a vital element being the automated process of recognition of a person's real identity: Biometrics. In recent years, biometrics has moved from using fingerprints, to many different methods of assessing human physical and behavioural traits. This useful guide introduces a new performance evaluation framework designed to provide complete coverage of performance evaluation of major biometric systems. Two key areas are presented: The first gives a unique snapshot of the performance evaluation of various biometrics within a common evaluation framework (databases and protocols). The second presents a state-of-the-art benchmarking evaluation framework for use in future performance evaluations - comprised of open-source reference systems