Page 176 - Automated Fingerprint Identification Systems (AFIS)

CHAPTER 8

ST ANDARDS AND
INTEROPERABILITY

To meet the challenges of interoperability, equipment, software, and systems
must be compatible. All systems do not necessarily have to consist of in-
terchangeable parts, but the more adherence there is to uniformity and
standardization, the easier it will be to communicate and exchange infor-
mation. This chapter looks at the development of standards by the American
National Standards Institute/National Institute of Standards and Technology
(ANSI/NIST) and the FBI for equipment and transmissions, as well as the
administrative issues that have to be addressed if systems are to communicate.
The chapter concludes with a case study of how identification rates can be inter-
preted in various ways due to the current lack of standardization.

8.1 SYSTEM CHALLENGES TO INTEROPERABILITY
Finger and palm images, textual descriptive data, SMT (scars, marks, and
tattoos) data, and other information useful for identification purposes may be
collected from flatbed scanners, livescan devices, palm print readers, etc. Scan-
ners may be used to digitize photos, sketches, or pictures. Depending on the
image, the digital representation may contain either color or grayscale pixels.
The images may be compressed before transmission and decompressed after-
ward. All of these procedures have worked well without a requirement for inter-
operability. Vendors developed, and agencies purchased, systems that were
unique to their own applications; the technology did not allow much cross-
communication.
Between 1970 and 1985, the first AFIS systems were developed. During this
long period, various approaches to AFIS development were used, not all of
which were successful. This was before National Criminal History Improvement
Program (NCHIP) funding, during which time agencies were dependent on
local or state rather than federal funding for their programs. Many of the early
AFIS applications were stand-alone systems that were depended on inked ten-
print cards. The operations were based on proprietary software from a limited