• Accessing a murder victim’s fingerprint-protected smartphone to help solve a crime

    Last month, when the Michigan State University Police Department approached professor Anil Jain to see if he could access a fingerprint-locked deceased man’s smartphone to aid in a police investigation, Jain accepted the scientific challenge. On Monday, 25vJuly, it was mission accomplished – Jain and his team unlocked the phone.

  • Separating the DNA of identical twins

    Since its first use in the 1980s — a breakthrough dramatized in recent ITV series “Code of a Killer” — DNA profiling has been a vital tool for forensic investigators. Now researchers at the University of Huddersfield have solved one of its few limitations by successfully testing a technique for distinguishing between the DNA — or genetic fingerprint — of identical twins.

  • How well do facial recognition algorithms cope with a million faces?

    In the last few years, several groups have announced that their facial recognition systems have achieved near-perfect accuracy rates, performing better than humans at picking the same face out of the crowd. But those tests were performed on a dataset with only 13,000 images — fewer people than attend an average professional U.S. soccer game. What happens to their performance as those crowds grow to the size of a major U.S. city? Researchers answered that question with the MegaFace Challenge, the world’s first competition aimed at evaluating and improving the performance of face recognition algorithms at the million person scale.

  • CBP issues long-anticipated Biometric Exit Program RFI

    Last Monday, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) issued its highly-anticipated call to industry to share solutions for the Biometric Exit Program. The Request for Information (RFI), issued by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), explains that CBP intends to add biometrics to confirm when foreign nationals are departing the United States, in order to deter visa overstays, to identify criminals, and to defeat imposters.

  • The accuracy of the FBI’s face-recognition technology may be improved: GAO

    The Department of Justice’s (DOJ) Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) operates the Next Generation Identification-Interstate Photo System (NGI-IPS) — a face recognition service that allows law enforcement agencies to search a database of over thirty million photos to support criminal investigations. The GAO examined the FBI’s face recognition capabilities, and the extent to which the FBI’s use of face recognition adhered to privacy laws and policies, and the accuracy of these capabilities.

  • Terrorist or criminal? New software uses face analysis to find out

    Pulling a poker face means betraying no visible emotion, so that opponents cannot tell what you are really thinking. But a Tel Aviv startup’s face-profiling technology recently proved fairly accurate at predicting which four players were most likely to beat out forty-six other contenders in an amateur poker tournament. The company say that its technology, which analyzes faces shown in photos and videos and classifies them according to fifteen parameters predictive of personality traits and types, can help identify terrorists.

  • U.K. to destroy biometric information of 45 terror suspects due to botched paperwork

    British security agencies will have to destroy fingerprints and DNA of forty-five terror suspects because the police retained the biometric samples longer than the law allows. The law does allow the police to keep biometric information of terrorism suspects indefinitely, but certain paperwork must be completed within a certain period of time to allow that, and if the paperwork is not completed, the samples must be destroyed. A new report reveals that Britain holds biometric information and materials on nearly 8,000 suspects.

  • Selfies could replace security passwords – but only with an upgrade

    The next time you do some online shopping or call your bank, you may find you no longer have to scrabble around to remember your security password. Banks are increasingly turning to voice recognition technology as their preferred way of ensuring customers are who they say they are when they use telephone banking services. But does this kind of technology really mean that you’ll soon be able to just forget your passwords? The short answer right now is “no.”

  • Forensics close in on footwear analysis

    First it was your fingerprint that gave the game away and then DNA analysis transformed forensic science. But “watch your step” because experts have developed a new technique which could lead to a step change in forensic footwear imaging. The experts have been able to extract additional information and create a digital picture of the personal footprint we leave behind when we stand or walk on a hard surface.

  • Faster airport lines with facial recognition

    More and more people are travelling by plane, so automating airport security checks makes sense. The use of biometric features is a way to identify people at airports. New technology detects and tracks you from the second you arrive at the airport until you’re out of the arrivals hall at your destination.

  • Senior Russian security officials exhibit “gunslinger gait”: Experts

    Experts have discovered a new gait pattern among several top Russian officials, including President Vladimir Putin and Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev. The researchers term this “gunslinger’s gait” because it may be triggered by KGB or other forms of weaponry training. The gait features a consistently reduced right-sided arm swing, highlighted in video material of the individuals studied.

  • New biometric measures to identify, track refugees

    Refugees applying to come to the United States go through several different security measures aiming to make sure that they who they say they are, and that they are involved with terror organizations or criminal gangs. The security screening includes detailed interviews, three levels of background checks, three fingerprint screenings, contagious disease screening, and cultural orientation. The United States has plans in the works for additional biometric measures, including iris scanning and rapid-turnaround DNA testing.

  • CBP begins biometric entry/exit testing at Otay Mesa port of entry

    U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) will begin testing new biometric technology at the Otay Mesa pedestrian crossing this week to enhance identification of certain non-U.S. citizens entering and exiting the United States. CBP says its Entry/Exit strategy includes three core pillars: identify and close the biographic gaps and enhance the entry-exit system; perform targeted biometric operations; and transform the entry/exit process through the use of emerging biometric technologies.

  • Large-scale face-search technology helps in fighting crime, terrorism

    The rapid growth in surveillance cameras is resulting in millions of face images and videos captured every day. The ability quickly and accurately to search all these images to assist in identifying criminal and terrorism suspects is an important and complex task that can contribute to making communities safer. To help in this effort, MSU has licensed its large-scale, automatic face-search system to NEC Corp.

  • New technique can tell whether a fingerprint belongs to a male or female

    Culprits beware: researchers are taking crime scene fingerprint identification to a new level. They have discovered a straightforward concept for identifying whether a culprit is male or female. It is based on the content in fingerprints — specifically amino acids. Amino acid levels in the sweat of females are about twice as high as in males. There is also a slightly different distribution, due mostly to hormonal differences. The same is true for amino acids left behind in fingerprints.