FBI steps up to $1B next-gen ID program
(Phys.org)—The good news is that the FBI is crawling out of the fingerprint age. They are moving up into a $1 billion project that will enable criminal searches and accurate identifications using updated technologies including a range of biometrics. The bad news, at least for privacy advocates, is one and the same. Privacy groups are asking, biometrics, at what price? How will they be used and who is to guarantee against their abuse? Nonetheless, the FBI is set to witness significant improvements to their existing fingerprint identification services, and there is an ambitious title behind their resolve, the $1 billion Next Generation Identification (NGI) program. Eventually this program is to encompass facial recognition, iris scans, DNA analysis and voice identification.