Application of digital technologies in fingerprinting (transition to creation, storage and research of materials in electronic format)

Yarovenko Vasilii Vasil'evich Doctor of Law Vladivostok State University of Economics and Service 690041, Russia, Primorskii krai, g. Vladivostok, ul. Gogolya, 41 yarovenko.46@mail.ru Other publications by this author     Pyatkova Oksana Vladimirovna PhD in Law Associate Professor, Department of Criminal Law, St. Petersburg Law Academy, 192012, Russia, g. Saint Petersburg, ul. Obukhovskoi Oborony,, 114 vladivostok.80@mail.ru

Cherednichenko Andrei Viktorovich retiree 690087, Russia, Primorskii krai, g. Vladivostok, ul. Lugovaya, 60, of. 9 andrey966@list.ru

Currently, one of the most popular areas of criminology in the system of solving forensic problems is fingerprinting, which continues to be relevant with the development of new types of expert research. Fingerprinting means distinguishing one person from all the others based on the pattern of his papillary lines. Fingerprinting means being able to recognize a person solely on the basis of fingerprints ^[3].

The basic rules for fingerprinting and filling out fingerprint cards of living persons and corpses are set out in Appendix No. 3 of the Order of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation No. 688 of 27 07. 2010. So, for fingerprinting a person, it is necessary to have forms of fingerprint cards, black printing ink of the highest quality (ensuring the preservation of fingerprint information, a roller, two smooth metal or glass plates for rolling out paint, a paint solvent or either special fingerprint kits, a table for fingerprinting.

The Appendix describes in detail the procedure for fingerprinting. It draws attention to the possibility and permissibility of using electronic fingerprint scanners in the formation of automated fingerprint arrays ^[16].

         In order to increase the efficiency of the use of finger prints seized from the sites of unsolved crimes, to identify criminals and in connection with the modernization of the automated fingerprint information retrieval system (ADIS) "Papilon" and the installation in the duty units of the Department of Internal Affairs in Vladivostok of the complexes of colorless fingerprinting "Live Scanner", the head of the Department of Internal Affairs in Primorsky Krai issued an order on measures to improve the efficiency of this system.

The order pays attention to the quality of filling out fingerprint cards:  they should be executed with black printing ink on a standard letterhead.   In the absence of forms, it is allowed to make prints on a sheet of white smooth unlined A4 paper (21x30 cm) in compliance with the established procedure for placing prints. Prints should only be of good quality, without smeared, clogged and unprinted areas of the papillary pattern.  Fingerprints should be placed strictly vertically, do not go beyond the boundaries of the frames on the form. There must be control prints of the fingers of both hands in the lower part of the form (sheet), and on the reverse side of the form of the fingerprint card (sheet) prints of the palms of the hands.

In the course of the study, it was found that this order is not fully observed by practitioners. Thus, during the initial fingerprint examination, it is not always possible to establish the identity of the traces with the papillary patterns of the suspects' fingerprint cards due to the absence of palm prints, or they were available, but represented only part of the papillary pattern, that is, they were of poor quality, which did not allow them to be used for identification in the future ^{[18, p. 18]}. A typical conclusion of an expert in such an expert situation is: "It is not possible to solve the question: is there a trace of the palm, the picture of which is presented in photo No. 13 to the expert's conclusion No. 159 of 13.03.2009, due to the fact that there are no fingerprints of papillary patterns of palms in fingerprint cards ^[6]. 

At the scene of the incidents, the traces of the palm are traces of tenar I, hypotenar, finger areas, etc., which, in terms of the volume of papillary lines displayed, exceed the traces of the phalanges of the fingers, therefore, the possibilities of research and identification of personality can be expanded due to the internal surfaces of the palms. So, during the fingerprinting examination, a forensic fingerprint examination was carried out by an expert of the ECC of the Department of Internal Affairs in the Primorsky Territory with a deployment in the Department of Internal Affairs in the Artemovsky City District. 

         The fingerprints of K.'s hands are made on a standard fingerprint card blank with a black dye by rolling the nail phalanges of the fingers, in the prescribed sequence, which is confirmed by control prints, In the prints of the thumb of the right hand and the middle finger of the left hand, K. papillary patterns are curled (loops-tangles), in the fingerprint of the index finger of the right hand papillary pattern is curled (double helix), in the fingerprint of the index finger of the left hand – loop simple radial, and in the prints of the remaining fingers – loop simple ulnar. There are handprints on the back of the dactocard. The quality of the prints is satisfactory, they are suitable for comparative research.

A comparative study by comparing the signs of a papillary pattern in the trace of the palm of the hand with papillary patterns in the prints of the palms of the hands of K. the coincidence of the trace of the palm of the hand and the imprint of the palm of the graft of the hand of K. Coincidences were established in the direction and steepness of the flows of papillary lines, the presence, location and mutual disposition of the details of the structure of papillary patterns, the presence and location of flexor lines of the trace and a fragment of the imprint of the sites "hypotenar" and "tenar-IV" of the subcutaneous area of the palm of the right hand.

Taking into account the high stability of papillary patterns, the revealed coinciding general and particular signs form an individual totality sufficient to conclude that the palm trace identified on the cover of the book was left by the "hypotenar" and "tenar-IV" sections of the palm of K.'s right hand.

The disadvantages include incomplete rolling of fingerprints (central zone, distal zone, basal zone, right and left lateral zones); smeared fingerprints due to pressure of the fingers; finger displacement; prints with a thick layer of paint; prints with smoothed papillary lines of the fingers; dirty or unclear prints, make the fingerprint card unusable to calculate the formula, registration and verification of a person by fingerprint registration.

         The quality of finger mapping is important for the proper study and comparison of the fragmentary trace of the finger or the characteristics of the papillary line using poro and ejeoscopy ^[9]. It is established that about 20% of the traces are recognized as unsuitable for identification. So, in the presence of 7 or less details of the pattern, the use of identification by conventional fingerprinting methods is impossible, but most of them are suitable for poroscopic and ejeoscopic examination ^[11]. The practical significance of poroscopy is to supplement fingerprinting, if its data are insufficient or questionable, which makes it possible to draw reliable and visual conclusions. Edgeoscopy makes it possible to study the features of the edges in the prints of papillary lines, subject to one very important condition – the trace must be received for examination without any preliminary processing, since the particles of fingerprint powder are commensurate with the size of the pores and can change the configuration of the outlines of papillary lines ^[10].

The study of the microrelief of the edges of papillary lines, the relative position of the pores and their position relative to the axis of symmetry of the papillary line, the size of the gap between adjacent pores, their number on the studied segment of the papillary line and the configuration of the contours of individual pores is carried out by visual comparison using various magnifying devices and special technical means.

Single finger marks found at the scene of the incident do not allow the identification of a person using a file registration system. To solve this problem, a proposal was made to create a monodactyl card file, in which the fingerprint of each individual finger is a separate object of the card file, using computer technology and provided that the papillary pattern of each finger will be described with a very high degree of informativeness, since the desired pattern must be found with a high degree of reliability in arrays of hundreds of millions objects (modern database volumes). The system should, if possible, provide a search not only for the complete papillary pattern, but also for its fragment (when identifying by handprints seized from crime scenes or corpses with significant putrefactive changes) ^[1].

An expert with a high level of training manages to establish the number and individual set of signs of the papillary pattern, especially those that occur frequently and have an individual character, understand and correctly evaluate the set of these signs and conclude that handprints are suitable for identification.

         Unidentified corpses are also fingerprinted to establish their identity. The corpse is badly decomposed, the upper layer of skin is missing or erased, old skin, papillary lines are indistinguishable, small papillary patterns, atrophy of papillary patterns, skin damage or injury.  In some cases, with the help of special chemicals, specialists manage to restore papillary lines" ^[13]. 

To restore the papillary patterns of the fingers on the removed epidermis of the upper phalanges of the fingers of the right and left hands of the corpse of an unknown woman in a criminal case of murder, a medical forensic examination was appointed. For examination, 5 dry gray-yellowish, oval small (up to 2x1.5 cm in size) fragments of the epidermis were provided without appropriate marking (indicating the ordinal number of the fingers from which the epidermis was removed). The use of Ratnevsky's solution did not give positive results. The expert concluded that the incorrect removal of the presented objects and the negative result of the restoration did not allow fingerprints to be obtained ^[7].  

In another case, hands were provided for forensic examination to restore papillary patterns. During the expert examination, it was found that the fingers were bent at the joints, the attempt to straighten them was unsuccessful. The expert, after separating the fingers, injected Ratnevsky's solution into the end phalanges. This method was used by them for a long time, but everything turned out to be to no avail. Then the forensic medical expert took photographs of each finger and produced photographs, which he sent to the investigator for fingerprint examination ^[8].                  

From the examples given , the following conclusions can be drawn: a) when removing the fingers or the epidermis of the upper phalanges of the fingers, the rules for the removal of physical evidence must be observed; b) in cases of damage, distortion or destruction of the upper layer of the papillary pattern, it can be restored by the inner "mirror" layer; c) if it is impossible to restore the volumetric papillary lines, photographs of papillary patterns should be photographed and made ^{[18, pp. 12-14]}.        Of course, in such situations, it is impossible to use a colorless scan of the skin of the hands of a corpse. In connection with the electronic form of the circulation of fingerprint information, the requirements for the quality of fingerprints (impressions) of the fingers of a corpse during traditional fingerprinting have increased ^[2].

         A colorless device for reading information from the skin of a person's hands has a number of disadvantages: relatively weak reliability of the operating system, cases of scanner "hanging", loss of some information, inability to make corrections, regular preventive maintenance of the scanner prism with a special cloth or napkin in order to obtain a high-quality fingerprint ^[14].  When scanning fingerprints, information about several characteristic points of the papillary pattern is saved, and it is impossible to restore the full image of the fingerprint from the stored information.

There are two types of errors in the operation of scanners. Errors of the first type are erroneous rejection of verification (False Reject Rate, FRR) when the scanner cannot recognize a registered user. The bioidentification system does not recognize the authenticity of the fingerprint of the user registered in it.  Errors of the second type consist in erroneous acceptance of verification (False Accept Rate, FAR), that is, false recognition – an unregistered user is determined by the scanner as registered ^[12].    

The term verification comes from two Latin words: verus ("true") and facere ("to do"). Literally we get – "to make something true", "to confirm". Verification is a confirmation of the veracity of data ^[15]. It involves comparing a scanned fingerprint with only one or several template fingerprints in order to establish whether a given person is exactly who he claims to be.

         The occurrence of FRR and FAR errors is determined by such characteristics as the quality and resolution of the scan, the scanning area, the mathematical algorithms used to compare fingerprints, the number of details that are used in the comparison. To reduce the likelihood of errors, fingerprint scanners have a glass surface made of high-quality glass with high scratch resistance. However, obtaining a high—quality print depends not only on the high resolution of the scanner - high contrast of the image must be ensured, as well as the absence of parallax. Parallax is a change in the visible position of an object relative to a distant background, depending on the position of the observer. In particular, the indistinctness of the left and right lateral zones of the papillary pattern.  The fact is that when scanning a fingerprint on the scanner glass, a fingerprint remains invisible to the eye due to sweat, which can affect the accuracy of scanning a new fingerprint.

         Currently, scanning is carried out in 2D format, which forms a two–dimensional flat image in two dimensions – width and height, as well as in 3D format, forming a three-dimensional image in three dimensions - width, height, length. Criminals leave voluminous finger marks on chewing gum, butter, cheese and other objects. Previously, technical capabilities were limited to obtaining a cast, now digital technologies through the use of 3D have expanded the possibility of their fixation.

         Modern biometric systems for civilian use allow you to quickly remove fingerprints.  Fingerprinting of all 10 fingerprints is not necessary, most often the thumb, index, middle finger are scanned, and the palm is not scanned, since information bases can almost always accurately determine the correct papillary patterns on the fingers ^[5].  This fingerprinting is intended for solving other tasks. When investigating crimes, several fingers may not be enough to establish the identity of a person, palm prints are needed, in particular, it is necessary to establish which hand and which fingers left traces, for example, on a weapon or an object used as a weapon.

         The high quality of the prints guarantees high accuracy of automatic recognition and coding of the papillary pattern (creation of a mathematical search image) and, as a result, an increase in the most important search characteristics of the system (reliability, selectivity, speed) ^[17]. Therefore, fingerprint scanners registration of fingerprints in fingerprint systems by the method of "live" fingerprinting, according to B. Yakushev, must meet the necessary requirements.

1. The size of the scanning area of the device should ensure that complete uncut fingerprint images are obtained, even for large hands.

2.                The ability to compensate for image smudging (for scanners performing finger rolling). The image of a rolled fingerprint is a scan of the pattern of papillary lines of the finger surface on the plane of the scanning panel of the device. The geometric shape of the nail phalanx of the finger does not coincide with the ideal surface of rotation in the shape of a cylinder, and during rolling, the finger slips along the sensitive panel with the formation of image smears. The more fully the finger is rolled, the more likely it is that a grease will appear.

3.                The ability to form high-quality images for complex fingers (dry, excessively sweaty, erased, with low relief of papillary lines). Images of excessively sweaty fingers are very dark, individual areas can merge into bright black spots, due to moisture filling the intercostal space of papillary lines. Wiping your fingers before scanning is not a solution to the problem, since the skin is moistened directly during scanning ^[17].

         Electronic programs compare the similarity of the signs of the papillary pattern of the fingerprint found at the crime scene with the fingerprints available in the database of the ADIS "Papilon-7" collection of fingerprint cards. Since the image of the presented traces on electronic media can be fuzzy, the Papilon system does not recognize them. The program only selects an image of papillary patterns from those available in the array, but not their assessment, which can only be done by an expert, comparing them with a real dactocard from the archive.

         The printing of the pattern image occurs in dots, which distorts the fine details of the pattern, the shape of the pores, the edges of the papillary lines, and makes them unsuitable for poroscopic and ejeoscopic examination. If the electronic printout of the papillary pattern image is unclear, the expert will have the opportunity to study the papillary pattern copied with printing ink on a standard fingerprint card blank.

The need to preserve these maps is explained by the confirmation of the authenticity of the papillary patterns belonging to a specific person. Traces on electronic media are questioned because of the possibility of their falsification, in particular, using image editors, you can make changes to the drawing: remove small details of the pattern, or replace them with others.

The question of falsification of handprints may be raised by the suspect, the accused, as well as by a lawyer if they have doubts about the origin of handprints or their falsification. The citizen was wanted for a long time. When they were detained, they were presented with a passport for another person. After fingerprinting and checking the records in the database of the ADIS "Papilon", his fingerprints matched the wanted man, who had a different surname. An electronic printout of papillary patterns was obtained from the database. However, the citizen continued to insist that he is the person whose passport he provided, and the electronic printout is unreliable (installation). A fingerprint card from the convict's personal file was requested. A comparative study found that it has papillary patterns of the fingers of a person who escaped from prison.

         Correctly, in our opinion, Yu.A. Dontsova noted that the simple inclusion of new-generation technical and forensic tools and methods in the existing standard classification of expert methods for detecting, fixing and removing handprints is not enough. This does not create conditions for the formation of a clear scientific and methodological approach to the expert study of handprints formed under the conditions of the negative influence of the properties of objects and environmental factors ^{[4, p. 128]}.

         Thus, modern digital technologies used in fingerprinting make it possible to speed up the selection and comparison of traces with papillary patterns available in the database for checking persons taken to the ATS. As part of the fingerprint examination, it is unlawful not only to decide whether suitable handprints belong to persons who are on automated fingerprint registration, but also to use as comparative samples of fingerprint cards of specific persons in the ADIS fingerprint array, but not provided by the person who appointed the examination.

In the fingerprint examination, the samples for comparative research are fingerprints and palm prints of the hands obtained experimentally from the suspect, the accused, the witness, the victim and issued in a procedural manner. According to paragraph 2 of Part 4 of Article 57 of the Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation, an expert does not have the right to independently collect materials for the production of a forensic examination, this right. In accordance with paragraph 1 of Article 202 of the Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation, the investigator is entitled to receive comparative samples. The competence of the expert does not include verification of the reliability of the objects of research and samples submitted for examination for comparison, as well as verification of the correct procedural design of materials. Comparative study of handprints and fingerprints of the persons being checked with the help of ADIS "Papilon" can be used only as an auxiliary method.

With regard to the identification of a person, the final decision is always made by an expert who is able to assess the quality of the original images and establish a high stability of the coinciding general and particular features forming an individual totality sufficient to conclude that the trace was left by a specific person. If there are doubts about the conclusion made, the expert has the opportunity to prove its reliability by comparing the electronic printout of the trace with the prints made on the fingerprint card in a typographic way.