DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE STANDARDIZATION EFFORTS

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DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE STANDARDIZATION EFFORTS

• Mike Peters
• Matt Radgens
• CSE 891
• March 31, 2005

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OUTLINE

• WHAT is standardization?
• WHY is standardization needed?
• WHY are we focusing on fingerprints?
• HOW is it applied to fingerprints?
• HOW does it apply to DoD?
• WHO is involved in standardization?
• WHAT progress has been made in fingerprint
  standardization?
• WHAT is the timetable?

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Exactly what is standardization??

• Biometrics used by ever-growing numbers of
  industrial and government organizations
• A set of criteria used by vendors worldwide
• Allows everyone to be on the same page
• Standards force vendor products to be compatible
  with each other

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Key Issues of Biometric Standardization

• 1) Developing common definitions vocabulary
• Obviously, this will allow people of different
  cultures and languages to interact with each other

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Key Issues of Biometric Standardization

• 2) Developing common technical interfaces
• Allows data to be transferred between networks
• Security
• Data exchange
• Conformance testing

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Key Issues of Biometric Standardization

• 3) Common data interchange formats
• What use is data if no one else can use it??
• Therefore, standards for data encoding are needed

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Key Issues of Biometric Standardization

• 4) Testing and reporting standards
• Develops methods to check performance of systems
• Discourages vendors from fudging or skewing data
  to sound more favorable
• Ex A product may produce low error rates, but a
  high failure to enroll rate

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Key Issues of Biometric Standardization

• 5) Legality and societal issues
• Ensures legal requirements are met
• Addresses societal issues as well (ie privacy
  issues

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Advantages/Disadvantages of Standardization

• ADVANTAGES
• Easier to communicate with other organizations
• More efficient different systems will not have
  to be made to perform the same task
• Better reliability and quality vendors will not
  produce cheap knock-offs

• DISADVANTAGES
• NONE
• Conclusion Is standardization needed?? YES!!!!

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Why did we select fingerprints?

• Fingerprint is the most common biometric in use
  today and has numerous applications

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Different applications of fingerprints

• Government uses
• border crossing systems
• passports
• ID cards, smart cards

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Different applications of fingerprints

• Commercial uses
• Cell phones
• Laptop computers
• Automobiles
• Smart guns

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Fingerprints have often been used by the
Department of Defense in conjunction with other
agencies for victim identification and more
recently, for identifying possible threats to
national security
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DoD uses of fingerprints for identification

• 1993 - FBI siege on Branch Davidian complex in
  Waco, TX

David Koresh
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DoD uses of fingerprints for identification

• 1995 - Bombing of federal building in Oklahoma
  City, OK

Timothy McVeigh
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DoD uses of fingerprints for identification

• September 11, 2001

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Other DoD uses of fingerprints for identification

• Crash of TWA Flight 800
• Crash of Value Jet plane in Florida
• Southeast Asian tsunami

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Since September 11, the primary objective of DoD
has been to preserve national security and to
capture terrorists and national security threats
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Red Force Personnel

• Definition - Red Force personnel are people on
  terrorist watch lists, enemy POWs, and other
  possible threats to our national security
• Mohamed al Kahtani - The 20th 9/11 hijacker was
  discovered after his fingerprints were matched to
  those in an international database

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Some fingerprint applications pertaining to
national security include

• National identification cards
• Passports
• Additionally, FBIs IAFIS system receives over
  50,000 inquires every day from 17,000 law
  enforcement agencies

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Is standardization a high priority for DoD??

• It has come to my attention that DoD
  organizations are currently using electronic
  systems that do not comply with the
  internationally accepted standard to collect
  fingerprint data from red force personnel As
  a result, the fingerprint data produced is not
  interoperable with the FBIs IAFIS and other U.S.
  Government and foreign fingerprint systems that
  do meet the standard. This problem must be
  rectified as soon as possible. In fighting the
  global war on terrorism, standardization and
  interoperability are key tenets of success

John P. Stenbit, Chief Information Officer, Dept
of Defense, February 2, 2004
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Fingerprint Standardization

• There are challenges with fingerprint
  standardization that do not exist in all
  biometrics
• Three different systems
• Minutiae matching, pattern matching, correlation
  (image) matching
• If the data/templates are of one form, all
  algorithms hardware must be able to handle that
  form

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What if there were no standards?

• If you had a minutiae based template, and the
  hardware was designed for pattern based data,
  either new hardware must be designed to handle
  minutiae based data, or a pattern based template
  would have to be used
• Consequences wasted time, wasted effort, wasted
  money
• This would be similar to trying to use
  Playstation software in an Xbox system

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Other possible problems

• Suppose only one vendor produced equipment
  compatible with the data
• If they were to go out of business, a whole new
  template would need to be created
• Consequences time-consuming, expensive,
  inconvenient, frustrating!!!

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Other possible problems

• Suppose that a vendor designed equipment better
  than what the Department of Defense had
• DoD would be unable to use the superior product
• With standards, periodic improvements could be
  monitored easily (standards could be changed)

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What organizations are involved?

• Organizations involved in enacting standards
• International Organization for Standardization
  (ISO)
• American National Standards Institute (ANSI)
• National Institute of Standards and Technology
  (NIST)

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Who does DoD need to interact with

• In achieving national and global security, DoD
  must coordinate their efforts with
• FBI
• CIA
• Department of Homeland Security
• Justice and State Departments
• INTERPOL (International Police Organization)

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Progress made thus far

• Most of the standards DoD has in place deal with
  data gathering, coding, and interacting with
  other systems

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ANSI/NIST-ITL 1-2000

• AKA Data Format for the Interchange of
  Fingerprint, Facial, Scan Mark Tattoo
• defines content, units of measurement, and
  format used by police organizations that rely on
  automated fingerprint ID systems
• includes 16 record types used by AFIS to exchange
  data

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ANSI/INCITS 377-2004(Finger Pattern Based
Interchange Format Standard)

• Specifies methods of
• creating templates
• utilizing ridge patterns
• Useful for small
• template sizes only
• not used for Red Force
• applications where a
• full fingerprint image is needed

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ANSI/INCITS 378-2004(Finger Minutiae Format for
Data Interchange Standard)

• Defines methods for creating templates based on
  minutiae points
• Useful when a small template size is needed
  (small storage size)
• Not for use when
• a full image is
• necessary

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ANSI/INCITS 381-2004(Finger Image-Based Data
Interchange Format Standard)

• This is the standard used to define how to use
  full fingerprint images
• Not limited by storage size (used for Red Force
  applications and latent fingerprint analysis)
• Drawbacks besides large storage size needed,
  this is a new standard and may not yet be
  supported in commercial products

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6 Key Issues of Standardization

• Definitions and vocabulary-DoD will abide by
  other organizations standards
• Technical interfaces - DoD will abide by other
  organizations standards
• Data interchange formats
• Functional architecture - DoD will abide by other
  organizations standards
• Testing and reporting
• Legal and society issues - DoD will abide by
  other organizations standards

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But much work still needs to be done.

• Most notably, standards need to be developed by
  the Department of Defense for testing and
  reporting systems
• Of course, ANSI, NIST, and ISO will have
  standards for testing reporting, but DoD will
  need to develop standards based on their own
  applications

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Testing and reporting standards

• Need to test performance (accuracy of systems)
• Need to test conformance (does it do what it says
  it does??) Conformance standards assure that if
  a product claims to adhere to standards, that it
  does.

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Tying it all together...

• So what does this have to do with national
  security??
• Standards allow different organizations to work
  together in creating global databases,
  identification cards that can be read worldwide,
  and speeding up the process of matching detainee
  fingerprints to terrorists
• Vendors know what specifications their equipment
  needs in order to be used by DoD

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DoD Timetable

• DoD Application Profile
• Standards requirements for supporting military
  biometric applications (Red Force)
• Proposal Submitted/1st Review May 2004
• Second Draft Completed August 2004
• Final Standard Finished 2nd Quarter 2005

Dates as of June 2004
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DoD Timetable

• Conformance Testing Standards
• Creation of Conformance Test Suite
• Proposal Approved May 2004
• Test Suite prototype completed 4th Quarter 2004
• Test Suite completed 1st Quarter 2005

DoDs plan is to fully deploy biometrics by 2010,
so a complete set of standards would be needed
much earlier in order to pass those standards on
to the vendors and other agencies, allowing them
time to create equipment that will be able to do
the job
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Summary

• Standards make development of biometric systems
  and cooperation with other agencies more
  efficient and less expensive
• Our national security depends on cooperation
  between national and international authorities in
  capturing terrorist threats
• In short Our safety depends on
  standardization!!!!

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For more information on standards currently in
place at DoD for other biometrics, check
outhttp//www.biometrics.dod.mil/Documents/zz_Sep
2004_DoD_Biometrics_Standards_Approach05.pdf
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References

• www.biometricgroup.com/reports/public/market_repor
  t.htm
• www.fbi.gov/hq/lab/disaster/disaster.htm
• DoD Aims to Build Database of PrintsProgram
  Targets Possible Terrorists, Marine Corps Times,
  Nov. 1, 2004
• Menke, Susan M. Thumbs Up, Government Computer
  News, May 24, 2004, Vol. 23 No. 12
• Department of Defense memorandum, Feb. 2, 2004,
  www.biometrics.dod/mil
• Howarth, Fran. Standardisation issues in
  biometrics, Feb. 14, 2005, www.it_analysis.com.
• Onley, Dawn S. DOD reveals biometrics plan,
  Government Computer News, Sept. 2, 2003.
• Woodward, John D, How do you know friend from
  foe? Homeland Science Technology, Dec. 2004,
• DoD Biometric Standards Development Recommended
  Approach, www.biometrics.dod/mil
• DoD Biometric Standards Development Recommended
  Approach, www.biometrics.dod.mil/Documents/zz_Sep2
  004_DoD_Biometrics_Standards_Approach05.pdf
• www.cnn.com