The Eaton County Sheriff’s Office in Michigan has started using mobile fingerprint scanners, reports WILX-10.
The mobile scanners are linked to the Michigan Automated Fingerprint Identification System and the FBI’s national fingerprint database via police officers’ patrol car computers, allowing police to match against state and federal criminal records within minutes. And the deployment is reportedly already paying dividends, with local police having used the technology to identify an individual with outstanding warrants.
In a statement announcing the use of the mobile biometric scanners, Sheriff Tom Reich explained that staff at the Eaton County Sheriff’s Office “strive to be leaders in the implementation of new technology which helps us become more efficient and effective.” WILX-10 reports that the Eaton County Sheriff’s Office is “among the first law enforcement agencies in Mid-Michigan” to use such technology.
It likely won’t be the last. Police departments across the US are increasingly adopting mobile biometric identification technologies, while federal agencies like the FBI continue to develop their own such capabilities and to cooperate with states in sharing biometric information; Michigan is one of four states known to be fully sharing civil ID records with the bureau for its FACE program, for example.
Source: WILX-10
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August 10, 2016 – by Alex Perala
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