New FBI System IDs People By Voice, Iris, More 151
cultiv8 writes "Under the system, state and local police officers also will eventually use hand-held devices to scan suspects' fingerprints and send the images electronically to the FBI center. 'It's a quick scan to let police officers know if they should let the person go, or take him into custody,' Morris said. In later stages, NGI system also will be expanded to include the analysis of palm prints, handwriting, faces, human irises and voices."
hmmm (Score:5, Insightful)
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just by asking this question you became one...
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If you have fingerprints, a voice, an iris, or "more," why then you qualify!
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Everyone.
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Everyone.
WE'RE #1! WE'RE #1! WE'RE #1! USA! USA! US...
Oh? Being #1 (by far) in the world in incarceration rate per capita is not something to brag about? But we have such fantastic privately run prisons.
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>>>Define suspects.
According to a recent leak, flying on a plane makes you a "suspect", such that the SA will collect saliva from you, for gene sequencing. This program is supposed to start next month.
Re:Define Suspects (Score:2)
Here you go.
https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Us_population [wikimedia.org]
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Persons who are being or who are thought to ever have been .... suspicious.
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You.
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Here you go [cambridge.org]. No need to thank me.
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Define suspects.
Anyone holding a city, state or federal public office position; police; C-level or board of directors corporate position, or anyone else they agree to designate will receive status "special executive handling". Othes be automatically deemed "suspect code 1" until further data is available.
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They used to be called consumers, and citizens before that.
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There is a difference between what you have to give and what police are allowed to take (e.g., your fingerprints from anything you touch in their presence).
Truly a geek dilemma (Score:2, Interesting)
As a geek, I honestly don't know how I should feel about this.
The technology is cool. The potential for abuse is frightening. This could be wonderful for helping local police capture criminals more quickly who are on the run from another jurisdiction. The "Big Brother" aspect of this having the potential to lead to a database of biometric information on EVERYONE is frightening. Will they take the biometrics gathered when foreigners enter the US and add that to the database automatically?
*sigh*. After weighi
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Re:Truly a geek dilemma (Score:5, Insightful)
This could be wonderful for helping local police capture criminals more quickly who are on the run from another jurisdiction. The "Big Brother" aspect of this having the potential to lead to a database of biometric information on EVERYONE is frightening.
These two aspects are more closely related than you make them seem. There would be no problem with surveillance if we could trust the government not to pass Orwellian laws. You say that making the jobs of local police forces easier is a good thing? What happens when it comes time to enforce a law that prohibits you from voicing a particular political stance (such as communism)? You won't want their job to be easier then.
A common argument made by law enforcement is the "limited resources" argument: even if they could technically arrest anyone, they do not have those sorts of resources, and therefore they will only go after people worth arresting. Such an argument becomes pretty difficult to make when you start talking about technology that enables the police to do more with less. If the job of two officers can now be done by one, then police resources have become less limited, and we should expect to see even more people arrested. Suddenly, those laws we passed years ago and said, "well, they will only go after the people who really matter!" have the potential to come back to haunt us.
We already imprison more people than any other country; why are we talking about making it easier for the police to arrest people? I would count "making it easier for the police to arrest people" as a negative, not a positive, until we undertake a monumental effort of legal reform to reduce the number of things people can be arrested for.
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"but TONS of people are pouring into the US. Daily."
Not those, he meant those who go back after a while.
With reservations, this can be a good thing (Score:5, Insightful)
If faced with having to have an on-the-fly fingerprint scan by a police officer, versus being handcuffed, stuffed in the back of a patrol car, fingerprinted, mugshots taken, and all that other stuff because of a potential suspect match, I'll take the fingerprint scan.
With almost all employers these days, just an arrest for any reason on a record (even if charges are dropped) means no chance of ever finding meaningful employment [1], keeping out of the handcuffs is paramount to keeping any type of meaningful career.
[1]: A lot of employers view arrest records as more meaningful than convictions because, "a thug can buy themselves an acquittal, while if a cop considers someone guilty enough to pull out the handcuffs and do the paperwork, they are guilty in this company's book."
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I
[1]: A lot of employers view arrest records as more meaningful than convictions because, "a thug can buy themselves an acquittal, while if a cop considers someone guilty enough to pull out the handcuffs and do the paperwork, they are guilty in this company's book."
Need a citation on this....personally I would rather be arrested 10 times then convicted once.
Re:With reservations, this can be a good thing (Score:4, Interesting)
Personal experience when hunting for a job.
When interviewing I'd be asked about my *arrest* record at many places (Fortune 100 companies on down), but not about convictions. Since I'm lucky enough to have no record in either department, I passed that test, but asked multiple HR droids why someone arrested but not convicted mattered, and got the response that was stated in my previous post.
Essentially it is used as a filter so the HR people have fewer applications to sort through.
Re:With reservations, this can be a good thing (Score:4, Insightful)
BTW, no, I've never been arrested and never will be unless the far lefties get their wish and turn the U.S. into some form of oligarchy.
I have to admire the political tribalism of the American people, who are so focused on the trivial public differences between the two wings of the oligarchy that the existence of the oligarchy itself is invisible to them.
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However, I'm sure they're quite capable of coming up with any reason for Not Hiring You, such as "we thought candidate Y had a more desirable skillset".
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that corporate world is a fucked up world.
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>>>I'll take the fingerprint scan.
"No warrant.
"No search."
- ACLU of Washington DC. I'll let them see my drivers license if I'm behind the wheel or a car, but they have no right to start collecting my personal biographic data (prints/genes).
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Except that this sets a strong precedent for "guilty until proven innocent."
Once you go down the path you outline, then what's to stop police from walking through a crowd of people saying "someone here is the person we're looking for, so all of you have to be scanned." You're not *required* to submit, but the few people who do have the nerve to refuse do then get hauled off for the lengthy process.
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Very true, which is why I state "with reservations". One fear I have is that a system like this would be put in place at subways and other public places where crowds go. Yes, it might catch the one fugitive who really wanted to see the Cubs win yet another World Series victory, but we as a society have to ask ourselves if the balance of security versus privacy is worth it.
Sadly, because of what happens at airports, we know that most people would happily climb into a vacuum bed for the whole plane trip if
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what's to stop police from walking through a crowd of people saying "someone here is the person we're looking for, so all of you have to be scanned." You're not *required* to submit, but the few people who do have the nerve to refuse do then get hauled off for the lengthy process.
Sounds like the TSA nudie scanner procedure.
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An employer typically may ask an applicant if he or she has ever been convicted of a crime. Asking whether an applicant has been arrested, however, may violate anti-discrimination laws, because the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has stated that minority group members tend to be disproportionately targeted for arrest, and whether someone has been arrested is not an indication that he or she has actually committed a crime. As a result, an employer who asks applicants whether they have
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That's solved by not asking, per se.
They ask you to sign a release for collecting background information, and you won't get the job if you don't.
That background check includes, among other things, arrest records.
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I would guess that this confers no protection to you if you are not a "minority group member".
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I found one: An employer typically may ask an applicant if he or she has ever been convicted of a crime. Asking whether an applicant has been arrested, however, may violate anti-discrimination laws, because the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has stated that minority group members tend to be disproportionately targeted for arrest, and whether someone has been arrested is not an indication that he or she has actually committed a crime. As a result, an employer who asks applicants whether they have been arrested, and then excludes those who have, may be engaged in discriminatory hiring practices against minority applicants. http://www.anticouni.com/CM/Custom/FAQ.asp?ss=faq-wrap-single-questions.xsl [anticouni.com]
This is hardly a law. It is merely an opinion of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission on a very broad interpretation of anti-discrimination statutes. And as has been pointed out by another responder, even that very liberal interpretation would not protect a non-minority from being denied employment based on that question.
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The only enforcement I am aware of for employers asking questions they are not allowed are lawsuits. However, most companies of any significant size ar
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If faced with having to have an on-the-fly fingerprint scan by a police officer, versus being handcuffed, ... I'll take the fingerprint scan.
They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.
- Benjamin Franklin
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The step that comes after the handcuffs and back of the car is the trip to the station, where you will be fingerprinted with INK, photographed from three directions, and provide one phone call before sharing a cell with the other local idiots. Getting only a fingerprint scan is clearly less intrusive.
I think you meant to make the point that police shouldn't be able to fingerprint people they suspect of crimes. There a whole problem with that too - when DO police act on a suspicion? Only when they persona
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Did anyone... (Score:3)
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I get the feeling that the days of being in public and anonymous are coming to an end.
http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=guy+fawkes+mask [google.co.uk]
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That's why I want one of these [slashdot.org].
Federal warrant search (Score:3)
Seems to me that it's just an easy, quick way to see if someone you've already detained has any outstanding federal warrants. One would assume they already do this, except back at the station with the suspect in custody and sitting in a cell. I mean, when the police stop you during, say, a traffic stop, they already run your tags and your name. Why not have the ability to run some biometric information as well?
Now, I do know that there are many issues with the accuracy of fingerprints, so I would prefer that they waited to roll this out until it was capable of the other forms of identification that aren't as open to interpretation or errors. And it would also be nice if the hand-held devices can only scan and check, and that storage can only be done back at the station/precinct/etc. That way the information for the database would only be gathered and stored upon booking and incarceration, rather than on simple detainment, suspicion, and questioning.
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What if you are walking? Bycycle? Sitting in a park? In most states, you only have to provide your name verbally (not physical id), and even then, only if the police officer has probable cause
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I see no problem with this personally if they have reason for search; however, unless they have a warrant, I do have issues with them storing an correlating this data.
To put it another way: if all this device does is hash the print and compare it to a specific flagged list of hashes, that's fine by me. If this thing adds my hash to the precinct database along with my name and physical description, the date, time, GPS coordinates and the officer's reason for taking the print, then I have an issue. In this
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They'll argue (and likely get court approval) that refusing to get a fingerprint is sufficient probable cause for further investigation.
No it doesn't (Score:5, Insightful)
This project does nothing of the sort. They've successfully convinced the FBI that they can build something of that description. Headline should read "Salesman successfully convinces FBI to buy expensive, unproven system off the back of some big promises".
Something similar already in use in the UK (Score:1)
The Lantern Project is a mobile fingerprint scanner already in use in the UK: NPIA [police.uk] I've seen it being used in the field on a reality TV show called "Police Interceptors" (yes, edited clips to make the Police look good)....the one time it confirmed a driver was who they said they were when they had no id on them. The other time the copper said, "no, you are actually Frank Smith, date of birth xxx", the suspect confirmed this and was arrested for outstanding warrants.
Already working on the next gen (Score:2)
did I read that right? (Score:5, Interesting)
Right now they are authorized to take your fingerprints if you are arrested. This was the tradeoff made when the whole fingerprinting thing came up in the first place, "you've already been arrested, you temporarily certain rights of privacy when arrested, in the interest of safety of the officers" was the original reason they were allowed to search your person. (and later, your vehicle) Then that was expanded to fingerprinting for the purposes of recordkeeping, and later for lookup in the database to see if you had any outstanding warrants etc. But this was all based on your being arrested and having forfeit certain rights as a result.
So now we're going to continue with the invasion of privacy, but just drop the justification entirely? So a cop can see you walking down the street and looking funny and can pull you aside and print you? If that doesn't say "papers, please!" I don't know what does.
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So a cop can see you walking down the street
I didn't see the part about stopping random people on the street. This device simply provides biometric identification capabilities that can verify identity. Which you are already required to provide should you be stopped for cause.
The people who have the most to fear from this are those with warrants already in the system who might otherwise provide a false name in order to avoid custody.
The down side is that any police stop could result in your prints and biometrics being entered into their system for s
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I didn't see the part about stopping random people on the street.
That's because it won't begin until this system is widely installed and 'if you have nothing to hide you have nothing to fear'.
Does no-one learn anything from history?
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The question people should be asking is, "What are fair and just rules for the inevitable use of these technologies?"
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In most states, you are only required to verbally identify yourself.
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In most states, you are only required to verbally identify yourself.
That has never precluded the authorities from using whatever means they deem necessary to verify that identification. If they think you are lying, you can be detained until they do so. This just gives them a rapid means of doing so. And gets you back on your way sooner (unless you have a warrant in the system already).
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Arrest: American.
http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/arrest [thefreedictionary.com]
An arrest may occur (1) by the touching or putting hands on the arrestee; (2) by any act that indicates an intention to take the arrestee into custody and that subjects the arrestee to the actual control and will of the person making the arrest; or (3) by the consent of the person to be arrested. There is no arrest where there is no restraint, and the restraint must be under real or pretended legal authority. However, the detention of a pe
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The popular summary of that definition of "american arrest" is to simply ask the officer, "am I free to go?" If he says no, by definition you are under arrest, and confirming that should be your second question. If they then tell you that no, you're not under arrest, but no, you're not free to go, then you need to start digging into "can you please clarify my legal status right now if I'm not free to go but not under arrest?" They can't detain you against your will without arresting you. The legal stat
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you confuse arrest wtih detaining.
you can be detained and still not arrested yet still NOT free to go (leave).
you ask if you are being detained. if not, you simply walk away. they have to progress from detaining to arresting.
'Scanning' (Score:2)
Innocent UNTIL proven guilty (Score:2)
The US legal system takes to heart the phrase "innocent until proven guilty" not to be confused with "innocent unless proven guilty". This mentality leads to a slippery slope of removing civil libirties until they can make their case. You are guilty right? They just haven't proven it yet.
I have the right to remain silent, how are they going to identify me by my voice?
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I have the right to remain silent, how are they going to identify me by my voice?
Probably around the same time you inform them that you intend to exercise that right:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/37448356/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts/ [msn.com]
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Hmm...sounds like a good time to start to learn sign language...?
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I have the right to remain silent, how are they going to identify me by my voice?
You have to specifically assert your right to remain silent. I suppose you could always write it down...
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I don't get it (Score:2)
If you have a warrant out for someone, you go and get them - you don't just check random people in the street in the hope someone has an arrest warrant out on them.
And if you observed a crime in progress or otherwise have reasonable suspicion that someone's just committed a crime, you arrest them on that basis and take them to the station.
I can't think of a single legitimate use case for this tech in the field.
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Today he'd haul you in until your identity could be confirmed. His probable cause is based on who he thinks you are.
Am I the only person who thinks that the solution to that problem is to raise the standard for probable cause, rather than making it easier for the police to check fingerprints?
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What would you have Officer Bob do? Walk away?
So a career criminal murderer/child rapist with a well-established alias and fake ID doesn't even take basic steps to disguise himself?
Only arrest or take into custody people he actually sees commit a crime or what?
How often does an officer just happen to spot someone and recall that they look like a career criminal murderer/child rapist with well-established alias and fake ID who doesn't even take basic steps to disguise himself?
The officer's job is to deal with crimes in process or to execute arrest warrants. The latter happens by having a good idea of the whereabouts of a suspected
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How often does an officer just happen to spot someone and recall that they look like a career criminal murderer/child rapist with well-established alias and fake ID who doesn't even take basic steps to disguise himself?
Often. People with disguises are often more recognizable than they realize. Think cutting your hair and wearing a hat makes you unrecognizable?
The officer's job is to deal with crimes in process or to execute arrest warrants. The latter happens by having a good idea of the whereabouts of a suspected criminal and going to arrest him, not by fortuitously spotting him in the street...
Wrong. You concept of police work is other worldly, to put it mildly. First of all, there would be an arrest warrant out in my scenario, but police are charged with seeking out and finding suspects even when no formal arrest warrant has been issued. Police are also supposed to prevent crime. Cops aren't there just to clean up the mess after the fact. In fac
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Often. People with disguises are often more recognizable than they realize.
Do you have any evidence for this? IOW, can you link me to any records indicating number of appropriate warrant arrests made in the street because the police officer recognised someone? Proportion who were trying to disguise themselves (beyond "wearing a hat")? As a proportion of the total number of people stopped in the street because they "looked like someone with a warrant out on them"?
police are charged with seeking out and finding suspects even when no formal arrest warrant has been issued.
In the immediate aftermath of a crime, perhaps. But then you're usually going on appearances and not names, aren't you?
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I can't think of a single legitimate use case for this tech in the field.
You are stopped for a minor infraction that would normally result in your being cited and released. But running a check of your name against outstanding warrants would result in your being detained for a more serious charge. This prevents you from providing a false name and walking away.
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Simplified:
You are stopped for a minor infraction that would normally not get you sent to the station and arrested and added to their database. Now, they can add you to their database without the inconvenience of taking you in. If you happen to already have a record, that's a bonus, and they can haul you back in anyway.
The corollary to this is: if you've already been stopped for a minor infraction using this system, you've got your prints in the database, so you're on the "haul in for questioning" list.
Iris? (Score:2)
Military does this in Iraq (Score:3)
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I'm glad that's working out well in Iraq.
But, the police are not the military. Citizens are not the enemy.
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Those same tools can be (ab)used to implement a police state, where every other citizen is (potentially) your enemy, and you are considered a potential-terrorist by every law enforcement officer.
Increasing the threshold of effort needed to investigate someone will reduce the number of people investigated (and thus) prosecuted; police don't like that, as it makes their job harder. Politicians don't like it, as they appear "soft on crime/pedos/terrorists" to the constituents.
Reducing the threshold of effort n
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We've been doing this in Iraq and probably Afghanistan for a few years now. It's purpose is to minimize the impact on the local people by quickly determining whether we needed to take someone into custody or not. Before that we would round up everyone that seemed suspicious and cart them off for questioning. Most people were innocent. Everyone was pissed off ...
1. The military. In a war zone. That is not justification for domestic use.
2. In a stable democratic country, it's good that everyone gets pissed off when their rights are trampled.
I have concerns if they use voice alone. (Score:1)
Granted, I'm not a machine so I have my flaws, but I would be worried about how accurate this machine would be.
Could be worse (Score:2)
an historical perspective (Score:3, Informative)
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Partick Henry to the Second Virginia Convention.
Given the abject failure of Patrick Henry's programme of war to create liberty in the United States or anywhere else, perhaps it is time to point out that he was wrong.
Peace is not surrender. War is not victory. War is FAILURE: the failure to think of a more interesting, creative, rational solution. It is an admission that you are an uncreative, often cowardly, idiot.
The NAZIs were worried about food security. That was their fundamental ethnographic concern: feeding the German people.
There were at lea
Take that you hyperboliced terrorists! (Score:1)
We gotcha!
Idiocracy (Score:1)
Unscannable!
Freedom means also to be able to commit a crime. (Score:1)
Freedom, also means having the right to commit a "crime" and maybe even a chance to get away with it.
Scary (Score:1)
Keepers or Pitchers? (Score:1)
'It's a quick scan to let police officers know if they should let the person go, or take him into custody,' Morris said.
And they spend money on this? This might have been hard in the old days, but now it's absurdly simple:
10 PRINT "Enter Citizens Name: "
20 INPUT X$
30 PRINT "TAKE INTO CUSTODY IMMEDIATELY."
40 GOTO 10
Anyone and forever now? (Score:2)
>"Under the system, state and local police officers also will eventually use hand-held devices to scan suspects' fingerprints and send the images electronically to the FBI center."
"Suspects"?? Oh, so they will fingerprint anyone they want because it is easy and faster, and keep that data on file forever? If so, then so much for civil liberties. Every time they search the database, they will be searching your identity along with it. You could end up being a suspect in numerous other "crimes" simply be
Hi, my name is Werner Brandes. (Score:2)
My voice is my passport. Verify Me.