fprintd(1) handles finger-print recognition for some kind of authentication (logins and who knows what else). At least on my current Fedora and CentOS systems, fprintd is automatically enabled. I don't know about other systems. Most of my systems have no fingerprint hardware, so the only effect is to polute the log. Here's an example: Nov 10 10:30:14 redface-mimosa-com dbus-daemon[637]: dbus[637]: [system] Activating via systemd: service name='net.reactivated.Fprint' unit='fprintd.service' Nov 10 10:30:14 redface-mimosa-com dbus[637]: [system] Activating via systemd: service name='net.reactivated.Fprint' unit='fprintd.service' Nov 10 10:30:14 redface-mimosa-com systemd[1]: Starting Fingerprint Authentication Daemon... Nov 10 10:30:14 redface-mimosa-com dbus[637]: [system] Successfully activated service 'net.reactivated.Fprint' Nov 10 10:30:14 redface-mimosa-com dbus-daemon[637]: dbus[637]: [system] Successfully activated service 'net.reactivated.Fprint' Nov 10 10:30:14 redface-mimosa-com systemd[1]: Started Fingerprint Authentication Daemon. Nov 10 10:30:14 redface-mimosa-com fprintd[28994]: Launching FprintObject Nov 10 10:30:14 redface-mimosa-com fprintd[28994]: D-Bus service launched with name: net.reactivated.Fprint Nov 10 10:30:14 redface-mimosa-com fprintd[28994]: entering main loop Nov 10 10:30:45 redface-mimosa-com fprintd[28994]: No devices in use, exit This happens every once in a while. I don't know what triggers it. Perhaps logins. I have a machine or two with fingerprint hardware. One scary effect is to compromise security -- fingerprints are probably easy to fake. This is only a problem if someone has enrolled in the fprintd system. Otherwise there is neither risk nor reward So: in both cases, it is probably a good idea to: sudo systemctl disable fprintd PS: I think that calling this fprintd instead of fingerprintd is a bit confusing. I used to assume these entries were about printing.