Automated Fingerprint Identification System (AFIS) interoperability will support public safety throughout the United States by ensuring local law enforcement agencies are better able to coordinate their investigative fingerprinting efforts. The Federal Government is facilitating AFIS interoperability by implementing standards, developing an overarching national connectivity strategy and infrastructure, and supporting state and local agencies in building connections across jurisdictions. This report describes the current state of latent AFIS interoperability and identifies actions that can be taken by Federal agencies to support the following:
- Acquisition of standards-compliant systems at the Federal, state, and local-levels;
- Furthering connectivity efforts among law enforcement agencies;
- Improved governance structures to reflect the new interoperable environment;
- Developing mechanisms to test system performance and standards compliance; and
- Expanded examiner training.
For over a century, fingerprints have been used among other applications to identify criminal and terrorist suspects, perform background checks, and monitor immigration status. In the context of a criminal investigation, prints found at the scene of a crime, known as “latent prints,” are compared with fingerprint records of known individuals who have been convicted or arrested for a crime. A latent print is an impression of the friction ridges of any part of a human finger. Latent prints include fingerprints that are not readily visible and are recovered from evidence or a crime scene. The highly variable characteristics of latent prints complicate the identification process.
When law enforcement agencies first began using fingerprints in investigations, the comparison process was entirely manual and based on visual inspections of features found on both the latent print and the fingerprint records. AFIS, first introduced in the 1970s, uses image processing algorithms to generate a list of potential candidates that share fingerprint features similar to an encoded image of a latent print. The algorithms assess “minutiae” and other friction ridge features found on the underside of the finger and on the palm.
Developers of AFIS software differentiate themselves from their market competitors by independently creating algorithms to extract features and match images of varying latent print quality. These proprietary approaches have resulted in insufficient interoperability among different AFIS systems to meet the needs of law enforcement agencies. “Interoperability” is the ability of two or more networks, systems, devices, applications, or components to use standardized encoding to seamlessly and electronically share information on demand and as authorized, without special effort and without loss of accuracy.
Interoperability of AFIS software would allow law enforcement agencies to search fingerprint records beyond those within their own jurisdictions in support of efforts to identify suspects and protect public safety.
True interoperability requires technical compatibility, network connectivity, proper governance, and performance testing and training within and between systems. A national effort to improve interoperability in pursuit of public safety objectives is underway in each of these areas.
The Benten Hall founder was a member of the Subcommittee on Forensic Science.
