Analyzing the Biometric Technology Phenomenon Term Paper

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Biometric Technology

Biometrics are those easily measurable physiological, behavioral or anatomical characteristics, which can be used in identifying an individual. A common biometric modality is fingerprints, but there are others like DNA, voice patterns, irises, facial patterns, and palm prints. Biometrics have been quite beneficial in the last couple of years for law enforcement and intelligence (investigative) purposes, mostly to the FBI and its associates. in the intelligence and law enforcement communities they not only help to validate the identity of an individual, but most importantly, to a person's identity (through a fingerprint left on a bomb or murder weapon, for instance), usually by carrying out a scan of the database to see if the fingerprints match that of anyone already under observation (The FBI).

Biometrics in national security

There is a rising interest in biometric usage for providing small-scale security for buildings and IT facilities and for access/I.D. card uses. This brief pays attention to the potential and large-scale applications at a federal level. These involve the Criminal Justice System, asylum and immigration, and security at both, port and border of states. Law has regulated the gathering of fingerprints by the immigration agents and the police for long. General legislation regulates other biometric technology (Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology, 2).

2.1. Criminal Justice System

At a federal level, the only biometric in general use is the automated fingerprint. An undercover project, finalized in April 2002, considered the idea of making use of one biometric identifier, likely default fingerprints, across the Criminal Justice System such as the police, courts, and the prisons. Already, prisons collect ink fingerprints from prisoners that have been convicted of some crime. This can be compared to the database of the police as a proof that they are holding the right person. An automated system would provide fast confirmation of the identity of a person and which makes it easier and faster for information to be shared about individuals (Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology, 2).

The police photograph everyone charged or convicted of an offence. Static photos database are already in the possession of some police officers. A good option would be to create a federal database for face recognition, which can be compared with NAFIS-National Automated Fingerprint Identification System due to its ability to execute searches depending on static photos taken in police stations (Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology, 2).

2.2. Immigration and asylum

Though biometrics are not currently in use for general purposes of immigration it could be possible for both passports and visas to carry biometric information to check the rampant use of deceitful documents, which improve security, or monitoring people's trips abroad.

the immigration service employs IAFS-Immigration and Asylum Fingerprint System on people seeking asylum, since 200. A complete set of fingerprints is obtained from all the applicants, with the purpose of detecting benefit fraud and multiple applications. Small-scale assessment has shown that this automated system is recording 98% precision before the verification of experts (NSTC, "The National Biometrics Challenge" 6). Enforcement officers with immigration service have portable scanning devices, through which data could be transmitted through mobile phones, which allows an instant check to be carried out on the activity of an individual. The law permits the sharing of these services with some other specified agencies for offences that concern only immigration (Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology, 3).

2.3. Port and border security

The areas that could make use of biometrics include; Confirming that the individual who checked in, is the same passenger boarding the plane, controlling the entrance to restricted zones, identifying known criminals or terrorists; and obtaining intelligence report on the travel patterns of individuals (Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology, 3).

3. Impact of biometric technology in U.S. intelligence community/Law Enforcement

However, the use of biometric data by law enforcement poses some special features and attendant problems. Biometric data gathered at scenes of crimes can offer useful evidence; nevertheless, such data is often presented as an anonymous data-which has no link to any individual known. In order to be useful, every Biometric data has to be matched to an individual's identity. In certain cases, the police is expected to be in possession of biometric methods; in some other cases, they have made use of surreptitious methods to gather biometric data from the suspects. The method of collection of biometric data and how they are used and whether or not the prisoners and crime suspects can be easily coerced to make it available are problems that are not covered adequately by already existing laws (Lewis).

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Counterterrorism brings up even harder problems. The United States gathers biometric data in Afghanistan, Iran, and several other locations. The data involve fingerprints, scans on the retina and other relevant biometric indicators (such as DNA samples). This biometric data is sometimes linked to an individual-for example, a person who will work at the United States facility. At other times, the link between identity and biometric data is not known, which is mostly the case when DOD gathers forensic information from a bomb scene. In recent clashes, the distinctions between domestic and foreign and between defense, intelligence and law enforcement have become blurred. There is need for the United States to be clear on rules governing the collection of biometric data by an agency from unknown individuals, some of who may eventually be a United States citizen or a citizen of ally countries, can be employed and shared between different law enforcement agencies and different governments (Lewis).

Finally, there may be concerns as to the possibility of people's biometrics being used for broader purposes unknown to them. For instance, one retina scan is enough to reveal a person's susceptibility to stroke; an information an individual would not likely want his/her insurance company or employer to have. In a similar way, advances in technology may make automatic DNA profiling possible, and along with it, the probability of arriving at some information that are genetically accrued the people. While over 1.3 million DNA samples are held in the database of Forensic Science Service, they are presently not permitted to carry out investigations on the genetic characteristics of recognized persons. However, these samples from scenes of crime, can and, will be, increasingly used to provide information about crime suspects to the police (Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology, 4).

4. Examples of biometrics used

4.1. Finger Prints

The oldest and most widely employed biometric identifier are fingerprints (Moore). Once the image has been scanned, it is checked for features that are unique and stored in the form of mathematical template. The next thing would be to store a matching algorithm to compare subsequent scans of the fingerprint with the template. Law enforcement agents depend on a score that indicates the resemblance of the biometric presented to the stored template with the aid of a number that has already been predefined or an algorithm to help determine whether the images are close enough to be accepted as matching images (Adkins, 542).

4.2. Facial Recognition

Systems for facial recognition depend on the images obtained from digital photos or videos, and compare the image captured to those in the database. Presently, such images are used to know the whereabouts of missing kids, reduce passport frauds, and fight identity theft (NSTC, "Facial Recognition" 2). Two approaches are used for carrying out facial recognition: view-based and feature-based systems (NSTC, "Facial Recognition" 2). These images are turned into templates and an analysis on local features brings up a faceprint. The facial characteristics (eigenfaces or principal components) are converted into some distinct set of numbers with the use of the eigenface method (Adkins, 543).

4.3. Hand Geometry

Similar to facial recognition systems and fingerprints, hand geometry is used to measure features such as width, length, and surface area as a way of developing an individual's hand template. In order to capture such features, a digital camera is used to scan the hand. In most cases, three distinct images of the hand are obtained before being assessed and measured with the aim of creating a template. When the identity of an individual needs verification, the template linked to that individual is brought out and again the hand is placed on another plate where the image captured again for creating a template (Moore). Then, the two templates are compared to create a similarity score that is either accepted or rejected, based on the previously established threshold (Adkins, 544).

4.4. Eye-Based Approaches

Traditional approaches for eye-based biometrics are retina scanning and iris recognition. Iris recognition obtains the iris image and keeps record of the pattern of the iris. This is a fairly new automated system and government officials are quite eager to make use of this system mostly because the iris pattern details are very unique. (NSTC, "Iris Recognition" 3) With this method, unique features are used to locate the iris. One major problem associated with this system is the interruption from eyelashes, pupils, eyelids, and reflections, which can go a long way to….....

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