Portable Biometrics Collection & Verification:
How Opentec can help collect & verifiy more metrics in the field, using more mobile, more durable & more 'open' platforms!

Fingerprint and palm readers, iris scanners, facial recognition systems and other biometrics systems used in buildings and at ports of entry are well established and becoming more prevalent. Even many commercial computers have user fingerprint verification systems on them. But what about mobile users operating on police beats, army personnel at remote border crossings in Afghanistan, customs officers aboard patrol vessels operating in waters off Australia's far north coast, or aid workers in a disaster zone after an earthquake?

The needs of security forces, police, immigration and customs officials or emergency response personnel all differ. Some need to verify identity as individuals are encountered, by comparing a person's biometrics with a database. Others need to collect biometrics data to create databases, that are compiled in central offices and then accessed by (often) several agencies, often for differing applications.

The commercial market is saturated with mobile fingerprint scanners and other commercial-grade hardware. However, when it comes to ruggedised field-deployable solutions, the range is nowhere near as great, with many products having been produced by vendors with litle if any involvement in military grade or heavy duty industrial grade solutions, suitable for permanent deployment in the field.

In 2007 we began a proof-of-concept exercise for an Australian state police force that involved adding a fingerprint scanner to our rugged PDA. After much consultation with the customer and the integrator, it became apparent that a simple PDA-mounted fingerprint scanner had limited applications.

For roles where iris scanning was required, a PDA's operating system and processor have limited capacity, making them unsuitable for facial recognition or auto-iris capture applications. They are, however, perfect if a user needs a compact platform, only needs to scan fingerprints and take mugshots, then locally verify a fingerprint against a watchlist (up to say 100,000 individuals), or communicate with a remote AFIS (Automated Fingerprint Identification System) to have a print verified against a central database.

For users requiring only fingerprint/latent fingerprint and mug shot capabilities, we deliver the DuoMetrics system, a Mil-Rugged PDA system for capturing full fingerprints, scanning latent fingerprints and taking hi-resolution mugshots.

For applications that required verification against larger databases (eg more than 200,000), and that required the ability to process mugshots or iris scans locally (ie in the palm of a user's hand), hardware with more powerful processing capability would be required. The answer often sought by others is to use a notebook based system with various attached devices, or a tablet computer with embedded cameras and scanners. But that imposes a size and weight penalty that many mobile users find hard to cope with.

Enter TrioMetrics, a UMPC based, Intel Atom based miniature tablet computer, weighing less than 700 grams. Coupled with the world's smallest, most accurate, portable, computer-based auto-iris imaging system, the entire system weights less than 950 grams.

Today we're partnering with leading software developers to create application specific biometrics solutions based on our open platforms, whether they be straightforward law enforcement applications, or in support of counter-terrorist activities aimed at collecting and sharing biometrics data in order to identify and capture those responsible for deploying improvised explosive devices (IEDs).

Discover more >>

  Product information:
      DuoMetrics: rugged fingerprint and mugshot solution
      TrioMetrics: rugged fingerprint, mugshot and iris solution

  Presentations:
      An Overview of Opentec's Rugged Portable Multi-Modal Biometrics Solutions (PowerPoint presentation)
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