Testimony of Assistant Director in Charge Michael D. Kirkpatrick,
Criminal Justice Information Services Division, FBI
Before the United
States Senate, Committee on the Judiciary, Subcommittee
on Technology, Terrorism, and Government Information
November 14, 2001
"Hearing on How New Technologies (Biometrics) Can Be
Used To Prevent Terrorism"
Good morning Madam Chairwoman
and members of the Committee. I am Michael D. Kirkpatrick,
Assistant Director in Charge of the FBI's Criminal Justice
Information Services Division, or CJIS, and I thank you for
the opportunity to appear before this Committee.
I have served in the FBI for
more than 23 years. In that time, I have served as a special
agent in our Cleveland and Kansas City field divisions, and
in various supervisory and management capacities in San Antonio,
Texas; Pocatello, Idaho; and at FBI Headquarters. In 1996,
I was appointed as an Assistant Special Agent in Charge of
the New Orleans field division, where I oversaw investigations
throughout the state of Louisiana. In August 1998, I was assigned
to CJIS. Since my arrival in CJIS, I have served as the Chief
of the Resources Management Section, and as the Deputy Assistant
Director of the Policy, Administrative, and Liaison Branch.
On April 4 of this year, the Attorney General approved my
appointment as the Assistant Director in Charge of CJIS.
CJIS was established in February
1992 and is the largest division within the FBI, with a current
work force of 2,685. The Division is located in Clarksburg,
West Virginia, on a 986 acre campus. Construction of this
world class facility started in October 1991 and was completed
in July 1995, and I am proud to say on-time and under budget.
Our mission is to reduce criminal
activity by maximizing the ability to provide timely and relevant
criminal justice information to the criminal justice community
and other appropriate agencies. The congress and the taxpayers
have invested close to one billion dollars for the development
and implementation of the sophisticated national computer
systems housed at the West Virginia complex. Among the major
programs managed and operated out of this division are: (1)
the National Crime Information Center, and (2) of interest
to this committee today - the Automated Fingerprint Identification
Program.
Since 1924, the FBI serves as
the national fingerprint repository. For our first 75 years,
the processing of incoming fingerprint cards was largely a
manual, labor intensive process, taking weeks or sometimes
months to process a single fingerprint card.
With the full support of Congress
and recognizing the dire need to significantly improve this
critical service, the FBI, with our partners in the criminal
justice community and leaders in private industry, including
Lockheed Martin, Planning Research Corporation (PRC), and
Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC), was
able to develop and build the Integrated Automated Fingerprint
Identification System, or IAFIS. IAFIS became operational
on July 28, 1999, and provides the FBI with a totally electronic
environment in which to process fingerprint submissions 24/7/365.
Today over 42.8 million digitized criminal fingerprint records
reside in the IAFIS database, which is by far the world's
largest biometric repository of any kind. It is at least four
times larger than all of the fingerprint repositories in Europe
combined.
Using state-of-the art technology,
the IAFIS receives, searches, and stores incoming fingerprint
submissions, and generates responses within two hours of receipt
for electronic criminal fingerprint submissions and within
24 hours for electronic civil submissions. IAFIS is a high
volume system with a capacity for growth. In fiscal year 2001,
our fingerprint receipts totaled 15,451,543 (7,991,125 criminal
and 7,460,418 civil), which equates to 1.3 million receipts
per month. Our FY 2001 receipts mark a six percent increase
over those for the previous fiscal year. In addition, each
day on average we add 7,853 new searchable criminal entries
to this database.
At this point, I have only spoken
about IAFIS's ten-print capabilities. This system can also
process latent fingerprints collected as evidence of a crime.
When a latent print is lifted from a crime scene, a latent
fingerprint examiner can initiate a search of the entire IAFIS
database to determine the suspect's identity. This technique
has permitted the identification of criminal perpetrators
from latent prints submitted from previously unsolved, "cold"
cases. Since the inception of this latent search technique,
the FBI's laboratory division has made 700 latent identifications
using IAFIS technology. These 700 identifications are more
than three times the total number of latent identifications
made in the 15 years prior to IAFIS. These crimes would have
otherwise been unsolved. This capability has had a tremendous
impact on our public safety.
In response to the September
11 terrorists attacks, CJIS mobilized, along with the latent
print units of the FBI's Laboratory Division, to provide disaster
relief. This assistance included our "flyaway" Interim
Distributed Image System, or IDIS, terminals and remote latent
fingerprint terminals. These computer systems allow disaster
relief teams to submit both ten-print and latent fingerprints
electronically to the IAFIS from remote locations. IDIS systems
have also been deployed in other recent events, such as the
Summit of the Americas in Quebec. Seven IDIS terminals, three
latent work stations, and 32 CJIS employees were deployed
to New York City; Dover, Delaware; and Shanksville, Pennsylvania,
to assist with victim identification. The New York disaster
relief team reported 22 successful identifications, four using
IDIS technology, and two using remote latent fingerprint technology.
The Pennsylvania disaster relief team made one latent fingerprint
identification.
On October 29, 2001, the President
signed Public Law 107-56, the USA Patriot Act of 2001. On
behalf of the FBI, I personally want to thank you for passage
of this most important piece of anti-terrorism legislation.
I can report that, pursuant to section 405 of this law, report
on the Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System
for ports of entry and overseas consular posts, the FBI is
working closely with the Department of Justice and other federal
agencies to prepare this report on the feasibility of using
the IAFIS to better identify individuals prior to their entry
into the United States. Since the IAFIS is the world's largest
biometric database, with an infrastructure already connecting
local, state, and federal agencies, it is a tool that could
be used to move our country's security perimeter beyond our
borders.
While the FBI believes that
the IAFIS is a national asset, its development has had significant
international ramifications. On a global front, fingerprints
are the most widely held and used form of positive identification.
In this regard, the FBI took the lead in an effort to develop
an international standard for the electronic exchange of fingerprints.
We frequently meet with our counterparts in the Royal Canadian
Mounted Police and the United Kingdom, as well as many representatives
from Interpol, on this topic. I am proud to say that international
standards for the exchange and transmission of fingerprints,
developed by the FBI, have been accepted by all member countries
of Interpol. We continue to have regular dialogue with our
international partners in the RCMP, UK, and Interpol on matters
of mutual interest.
Technology for the capture,
search, storage, and transmission of fingerprints is widely
available and becoming more economical every day. Fingerprint
databases already exist at the local, state, and federal levels,
and all existing criminal history records are based on fingerprints.
As I just stated, international standards have been accepted
by all Interpol member countries. These existing biometric
systems form the foundation for coordinated domestic and international
efforts and present opportunities to share information that
can improve our national security and combat terrorism and
trans-national crime.
I invite the members of this
committee to visit the CJIS complex in Clarksburg and witness
first-hand this investment in state-of-the-art technology.
In closing, I again thank you for the privilege of addressing
this Committee. I am available to answer any questions the
Committee may have.
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