Crimtrac wants fingerprints for background checks
17 May, 2010
category: Biometrics, Government
Crimtrac, an agency in the Australian government set to help find ways technology can support law enforcement in solving crimes in the country, has suggested tying fingerprints to passports for the nation’s citizens to help improve name only-based background checks, according to a Network World article.
Crimtrac manager of background checking, Roberta Kennett, has said that checking the Crimtrac National Police Checking Service using just a name yields too broad results resulting in large amounts of time manually eliminating names.
In addition to saving agents time when performing matches for background checks, Crimtrac expects including biometrics in the search will also decrease instances of incorrect identifications. Some of the barriers the agency faces in trying to get the new policies approved include utilizing the National Automated Fingerprint Identification System, which doesn’t have all of the country’s citizens enrolled, as well as necessary reform of consent to view biometric information for the agencies involved.
Read the full story here.