On Fri, 8 Jan 2016 06:01:47 -0500, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:

"The Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System,

I think that if they actually had a good computerized fingerprint
system, it might call into question the infallibility of fingerprints.
I wonder how many matches they will have with different people and how
many points match if they did a global search of the database.
There are a number of cases where "experts" have positively matched
fingerprints and then found out they were wrong. This is really more
of an art than a science and there is a lot of opinion in the
identifications. The examiner decides which points match, which don't
and which are inconclusive.

If this does get melded with a number of other biometric parameters it
would be much more useful but fingerprints alone are usually only
valuable when you have the print and an otherwise implicated suspect.
The first step might be to get better samples of everyone's
fingerprints because those smudgy cards they have now are far from
perfect. That is from the fingerprint guy at my sheriffs office. He
said that when they actually submit these to the FBI for something,
about half of them are rejected.

The up side of the computer is that it takes a lot of the "art" out of
this discipline and adds more impartial science. The computer will not
look at them with an opinion in mind.