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1700 BCE
Places of Origin
Although the time when fingerprint identification began is unknown, archaeologists discovered fingerprints pressed into clay tablet contracts from 1792-1750 B.C. in Babylon. In ancient China, many used inked fingerprints on official documents. The oldest documents dated back to third century B.C. China where they found finger and palm prints pressed into clay and wood writing surfaces used to authenticate official seals and legal documents. -
Dr. Nehemiah
The earliest record of study goes back to Dr. Nehemiah writing a paper describing the patterns he saw on human hands under the microscope, including ridges. -
Johann Christoph Andreas Mayer
Following Dr. Nehemiah, he described that "the arrangement of skin ridges is never duplicated in two persons, probably being the first scientist recognize this. -
Jan Evangelist Purkyn
Purkyn described nine distinct fingerprint patterns that included loops, spirals, circles, and double whorls. -
Sir William Herschel
He began collecting fingerprints and then noticed the unique patterns to each person and they were not altered by age. -
Alphonse Bertillon
In 1879, he was an assistant clerk in the records office at the Police Station in Paris, and he created a way to identify criminals. The system which is sometimes referred to as Bertillonage, was first used in 1883 to identify a repeating offender. In 1902, he was then credited with solving the first murder using fingerprints. -
Sir Francis Galton
He verified that fingerprints don't change with age and along with Sir E. R. Henry, developed the classification system for fingerprints which is still used in the US and Europe. -
Ivan (Juan) Vucetich
He improved fingerprint collection by beginning to note measurements on the identification cards of all arrested person, as well as adding 10 fingerprint impressions. He created his own fingerprint classification system and invented a better way of collecting the impressions. -
Sir Edmund Richard Henry
Along with the help of two colleagues, he created a system which divided fingerprint records into groups based on whether they have an arch, whorl, or loop pattern. Each fingerprint card in the system was imprinted with all 10 fingerprints of a person and marked with individual characteristics called a "ten card." -
FBI Advancements
The FBI launched its Advance Fingerprint Identification Technology (AFIT) system, enhancing fingerprint and latent print processing services. Increasing accuracy, daily processing capacity of the agency, and improving the system's availability, it implemented new fingerprint matching algorithm.. With AFIT, the FBI has been able to reduce the number of required manual fingerprint reviews by 90%.