USE OF FINGERPRINTS IN LAW ENFORCEMENT

USE OF FINGERPRINTS IN LAW ENFORCEMENT
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(12, December, 2010)
Use of Fingerprints in Law Enforcement
The issue of fingerprinting has been an issue in law enforcement following the 9/11 terrorist bombing in United sates world trade center. There has been an ongoing government war against terrorism just as in the other parts of the world (Haber & Ralph, 2009).
Governments and security agents have been heavily investing in developing a biometric standard/finger printing technology that can enable law enforcement officers to identify airline passengers, control access to buildings of high security and to facilitate recording of details of convicted criminals. Fingerprinting have employed the new technology of biometric technology which use a chip to store personal information like fingerprints, iris patterns and even face scans to help in curbing the increasing cases of terrorism, cyber crime and terrorism (Cole, 2002). The major issue with fingerprinting as it concerns law enforcers is to authenticate remote user and being able to reasonably be the individual he purports to be and to make e-business systems safer for the diverse stakeholders involved. Some other traditional methods like the use us of passwords, public and private keys and various for of encryption have been used for authentication purpose by law enforcement agencies (Jones, 2000).
Biometrics based on the behavioral and physiological aspect can be defined as use of automated methods to physiologically verify or recognize a living person using fingerprint or iris patterns as well as employing some aspects of behavior like key stroke patterns and handwriting.
Fingerprinting scanning is intrinsically linked to an individual hence can not be stole, lost or transferred between individual hence it a unique identifier method. Secondly fingerprints persist over time and there are no two fingerprints can be identical and this greatly aids in linking thus ensures access key to that specific user.
This system basically involves matching relationships amongst the points on the fingertips where print ridges end or divide but more complex scanning systems of the same procedure examine feature...