A groundbreaking study at Columbia University challenges the long-held belief that every fingerprint on a person’s hand is completely unique.
According to the BBCthe research team has developed an AI tool that can analyze human fingerprints to determine whether they belong to the same person.
The researchers report that the technology was able to identify with between 75% and 90% accuracy whether prints from different fingers came from one person. However, the exact mechanics of how the AI achieved this remains a mystery.
Help solve crimes
“We’re not sure how the AI does it,” admitted Prof. Hod Lipson, a roboticist at Columbia University who oversaw the research. To ensure it was correct, the team repeated the process over and over again, achieving the same results each time.
The researchers’ theory is that the tool analyzes fingerprints – which are formed at birth – in a way that is different from what is traditionally done, focusing more on the orientation of the ridges in the center of a finger than on the pattern in your fingers. which individual ridges end and divide, known as minutiae.
Despite the promising results, the Columbia University team admits that further research is necessary. The AI tool was trained on a large dataset of 60,000 fingerprints, but a larger number, including partial prints and low-quality prints, would be needed to further refine the technology.
The findings of this study, which has undergone peer review, will be published in the journal Scientific progress, could have a significant impact on biometrics and forensic science. As the BBC reports, if an unidentified fingerprint is discovered at one crime scene and an unidentified index fingerprint is discovered at another, the AI tool could potentially match the two prints to the same person. That won’t be good enough – for now – to solve crimes on its own, but it could help the police in their investigation.
The revelation that fingerprints may not be unique to everyone is not a surprise to everyone. Graham Williams, professor of forensic sciences at the University of Hull, admitted: ‘We don’t actually know that fingerprints are unique. All we can say is that, as far as we know, no two people have yet to show the same fingerprints. “