National ID cards - good idea?

[snowychap]

Thought I'd said it before but will do so again in smaller talk

'smaller talk'?

Are ID cards going to help us discuss the weather (or even less profound subjects)?

Bickster, Maxine Carr was irrelevant bullshit as you quaintly say, it was only two young children that she had involvelment with. She had no involvement in your opinion? Can I ask a question, if it was your daughter, would you have no problems with Maxine saying the same thing

l

And the relevance to ID cards is what?

I think Bicks was questioning her relevance to a debate about ID cards rather than condoning all that she had done in her life.

Oh and again Would you like to explain to all of us not 'involved' in fraud issues, how this will actually help to prevent fraud, then, please?

[villanfromluton]

snowychap, I wot discuss how it will prevent fraud, though I could.

As for Maxine Carr, it's bloody awful that she was caught out from a Tesco card

As for fraud issues, I think the economy is really strong at the moment, does not need any help in trying to stop people from taking from the Country. Do you agree

[bickster]

Thought I'd said it before but will do so again in smaller talk

Bickster, Maxine Carr was irrelevant bullshit as you quaintly say, it was only two young children that she had involvelment with. She had no involvement in your opinion? Can I ask a question, if it was your daughter, would you have no problems with Maxine saying the same thing

l

Seriously do you really believe the only evidence they had against Maxine Carr was a Tesco Clubcard?

If it was my daughter I very much doubt I'd be extolling the virtues of a database society to catch some criminals that were caught by good old fashioned policing (note the database society aspect of the policing failed - the CRB checks were **** up on Huntley completely) So I'd probably saying lets invest in more "traditional" resources for the police, this database bullshit doesn't work

[villanfromluton]

Thought I'd said it before but will do so again in smaller talk

Bickster, Maxine Carr was irrelevant bullshit as you quaintly say, it was only two young children that she had involvelment with. She had no involvement in your opinion? Can I ask a question, if it was your daughter, would you have no problems with Maxine saying the same thing

l

Seriously do you really believe the only evidence they had against Maxine Carr was a Tesco Clubcard?

If it was my daughter I very much doubt I'd be extolling the virtues of a database society to catch some criminals that were caught by good old fashioned policing (note the database society aspect of the policing failed - the CRB checks were **** up on Huntley completely) So I'd probably saying lets invest in more "traditional" resources for the police, this database bullshit doesn't work

Yes, even you ignored what I said, shame on the girl. she didnt deserve it :?:

[bickster]

Thought I'd said it before but will do so again in smaller talk

Bickster, Maxine Carr was irrelevant bullshit as you quaintly say, it was only two young children that she had involvelment with. She had no involvement in your opinion? Can I ask a question, if it was your daughter, would you have no problems with Maxine saying the same thing

l

Seriously do you really believe the only evidence they had against Maxine Carr was a Tesco Clubcard?

If it was my daughter I very much doubt I'd be extolling the virtues of a database society to catch some criminals that were caught by good old fashioned policing (note the database society aspect of the policing failed - the CRB checks were **** up on Huntley completely) So I'd probably saying lets invest in more "traditional" resources for the police, this database bullshit doesn't work

Yes, even you ignored what I said, shame on the girl. she didnt deserve it :?:

I ignored it because it was irrelevant emotive bollocks

[villanfromluton]

Thought I'd said it before but will do so again in smaller talk

Bickster, Maxine Carr was irrelevant bullshit as you quaintly say, it was only two young children that she had involvelment with. She had no involvement in your opinion? Can I ask a question, if it was your daughter, would you have no problems with Maxine saying the same thing

l

Seriously do you really believe the only evidence they had against Maxine Carr was a Tesco Clubcard?

If it was my daughter I very much doubt I'd be extolling the virtues of a database society to catch some criminals that were caught by good old fashioned policing (note the database society aspect of the policing failed - the CRB checks were **** up on Huntley completely) So I'd probably saying lets invest in more "traditional" resources for the police, this database bullshit doesn't work

Yes, even you ignored what I said, shame on the girl. she didnt deserve it :?:

The main reason Maxine Carr was linked to the murders was by the tesco clubcards. You may not like it but that is a fact. She bought cleaning substances that was not normal and it was shown on the clubcard and it showed an involvement. It was not the only evidence perhaps, but it was a major piece of enquiry.

[villanfromluton]

Bickster, would you like to reply before I go to bed?

[bickster]

yeah right and I suppose the bodies and the forensics were irrelevant........it was the clubcard that done for them

We'd have been alright love if it hadn't been for that Meddling clubcard

the again the kids would still be alive if the database had worked and the police checks had been thorough enough, its not like he didnt have previous cautions

But if it hadn't been for that clubcard...................

[snowychap]

snowychap, I wot discuss how it will prevent fraud

Fair enough.

I'd suggest that is because you can't.

though I could.

Oh, ok. I'll take some nameless person's word on the internet then.

As for Maxine Carr, it's bloody awful that she was caught out from a Tesco card

???

As for fraud issues, I think the economy is really strong at the moment, does not need any help in trying to stop people from taking from the Country. Do you agree

I have absolutely no idea what you are trying to say here.

[villanfromluton]

yeah right and I suppose the bodies and the forensics were irrelevant........it was the clubcard that done for them

We'd have been alright love if it hadn't been for that Meddling clubcard

the again the kids would still be alive if the database had worked and the police checks had been thorough enough, its not like he didnt have previous cautions

But if it hadn't been for that clubcard...................

If she had been involved with the bodies she would have been in nick for far longer than she was.

[johnvillan]

Huntley also granted television interviews to the press, and his unusual interest, together with his emotional involvement, made investigators suspicious, leading to a wider search which revealed the half-burned remains of Holly & Jessica’s shirts, in a storage building at Soham College where Huntley was employed.

link

This is how they were found out.

[snowychap]

ID card scheme faces new hurdle

The national identity card scheme faces fresh problems following a warning from the government's top scientific advisers that the quality of fingerprints from 4 million people aged over 75 may be too poor to be used to prove their identity.

The "gold standard" integrity of the national identity scheme would depend on all 10 digits of the hands of everyone in Britain over 16 being accurately recorded on the central register, but experts have now told Home Office ministers that it is "hard to obtain good quality fingerprints" from the over-75s.

They warned that "exceptional handling" arrangements would have to be made to handle the registration of those whose fingerprints are not up to scratch. This would have a "large impact not only on the technical elements of the scheme but [also] on businesses processes, schedules and costs".

American experts estimate between 2% and 5% of adults have poor quality fingerprints, which means ridges on the fingers are not sharply defined enough to be reliably copied by an automatic scanner.

The warning is contained in a report slipped out before Parliament rose for the summer recess from the biometrics assurance group, which is made up of independent experts from Whitehall, the industry and universities and chaired by the government's chief scientific adviser, Professor John Beddington. The group was set up to review the science behind the ID card scheme.

The group said urgent research was needed into the problem. It told ministers they needed to make available alternative identity checks based on electronic iris scans, for those unable to enrol using fingerprints. The Home Office, however, has ruled out the use of iris scanning because it is too expensive.

An Identity and Passport Service spokesman said the body disagreed with the expert assessment of the problem: "We anticipate that situations in which fingerprint image quality is so poor that it is unusable will be extremely rare. Even in the 75-plus age group, print quality is normally perfectly usable.

"On the very rare occasions when a fingerprint image falls below the quality required for automated matching it is passed to a fingerprint expert who carries out the coding manually so it can be stored on the database." He added that a fingerprint expert could also manually compare two fingerprints to confirm a person's identity.

However, the national ID card scheme depends not only on fingerprints being accurately recorded on registration but being good enough to be repeatedly scanned to confirm somebody's identity when the system is up and running.

The scientific and technical experts also voiced wider concern that difficulties in enrolling people with "challenging biometrics" had not been sufficiently tested in the ID card trials so far. They suggested the test group needed to be expanded to include those who were "elderly, mute, non-English speaking, blind or visually impaired".

The Royal National Institute of Blind People has already raised concerns about the difficulties faced by visually impaired people registering under the scheme.

The first ID cards under the scheme are due to be issued next year to staff in security-sensitive locations, such as airports, with young people to follow in 2010.

Phil Booth, national coordinator of the No2ID campaign, said the report confirmed millions would suffer inconvenience, distress and worse under the ID regime. He said: "Suggestions manual checks will suffice every time the computer says 'no' begs the question, what is the point of the system in the first place?"

He said the problems raised about the biometrics were fundamental and meant that compulsory fingerprinting would embed discrimination at the heart of the ID card scheme. "Higher failure rates for the old, ethnic minorities, the disabled and the infirm risk creating a biometric underclass," he warned.

The group of independent scientific and technical experts also said that proper attention needed to be paid to issues of privacy and consent across the national identity scheme, and urged the public to be well-informed about how their data could be used and shared with certain government bodies without the consent of the individual involved.

[Santa_Rosa]

A biometric underclass eh? Blimey.

[Gringo]

A biometric underclass eh? Blimey.

Non-issue - in the future state world all of those impacted by such issues will have long been terminated once the crystal in their hand started pulsing.

[snowychap]

Ministry of Justice loses 45,000 personal records

The Government’s reputation for protecting people’s sensitive electronic data has been dealt yet another blow with the revelation that the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) lost the records of 45,000 people.

The information included dates of birth, national insurance numbers, criminal records, and in a single incident, the loss of bank details and other information belonging to 27,000 people working for suppliers to the department.

In another case, officials lost an “inadequately protected” laptop storing the job applications of 13 people who were applying for judicial positions with the service.

The revelations in the department’s annual accounts come after similar blunders saw two CDs with the child benefit records of 25 million families lost in the post and the loss of 658 laptops by the Ministry of Defence.

In 30,000 cases the MoJ did not notify the people affected, judging that it did not need to do so after carrying out a risk assessment.

In January an "inadequately protected" laptop containing records of 14,000 fine defaulters including names, dates of birth, addresses, offences, and - in a fifth of cases - national insurance numbers, went missing from a "secured" government office.

In June 2007 records of 27,000 people working for suppliers to the MoJ, again kept on “inadequately protected” storage devices, were lost.

Two other laptops and several other storage devices were mislaid in 2007, leading to the loss of names, dates of birth and national insurance numbers of 145 court appellants, and the names of 138 criminals and the offences committed by them.

Liberal Democrat Justice spokesman David Howarth MP said: "Yet again the Government has shown that it cannot be trusted with citizens' personal data.

"How can ministers possibly argue for the introduction of a universal ID Card scheme when they can't even keep safe the data they already have."

An MoJ spokesman said: "Risk assessments were carried out to assess who, if anyone, should be notified and to ensure measures were in place to mitigate risk to individuals and to prevent a recurrence of the incident.

"The dsepartment will continue to monitor and assess its information risks in order to identify and address any weaknesses and ensure continuous improvement of its systems."

He said the ministry is planning to implement a dedicated information assurance programme to oversee and ensure that electronic information and documents are "managed, stored and disposed of in a manner that inspires high levels of parliamentary and public trust and confidence".

In April the Information Commissioner said he was notified of 94 data breaches since the loss last year of the child benefit database – two thirds were committed by the Government and other public sector bodies.

[snowychap]

New York Would Photograph Every Vehicle Entering Manhattan and Sniff Out Radioactivity

The Police Department is working on a plan to track every vehicle that enters Manhattan to strengthen the city’s guard against a potential terror attack, the department’s chief spokesman said.

Police Want Tight Security Zone at Ground Zero (August 12, 2008) The proposal — called Operation Sentinel — relies on integrating layers of technologies, some that are still being perfected. It calls for photographing, and scanning the license plates of, cars and trucks at all bridges and tunnels and using sensors to detect the presence of radioactivity.

Data on each vehicle — its time-stamped image, license plate imprint and radiological signature — would be sent to a command center in Lower Manhattan, where it would be indexed and stored for at least a month as part of a broad security plan that emphasizes protecting the city’s financial district, the spokesman, Paul J. Browne, said. If it were not linked to a suspicious vehicle or a law enforcement investigation, it would be eliminated, he said.

“Our main objective would be to, through intelligence, find out about a plot before it ever got to a stage where a nuclear device or a dirty bomb was coming our way,” Mr. Browne said. “This provides for our defense after a plot has already been launched and a device is on its way.”

The proposal is one element of a 36-page plan for security, mainly focused on the site of ground zero, that Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly and his counterterrorism bureau commanders have shared with the director of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

For months, Mr. Kelly and his command staff have been urging the creation of a London-style surveillance system for the financial district that relies on license plate readers, movable roadblocks and 3,000 public and private security cameras below Canal Street, all linked to a coordination center at 55 Broadway. Known as the Lower Manhattan Security Initiative, the center is to open in September.

At the same time, a federal Securing the Cities program is going forward: The police are creating links with law enforcement agencies within a 50-mile radius around the city. That plan includes outfitting officers with radiation detectors to stop a nuclear or radiological threat as far from the target as possible.

Operation Sentinel would combine strategies from the security initiative and Securing the Cities and use them at choke points into Manhattan.

Mr. Browne could not say when the program would be completed, though the Lower Manhattan initiative is expected to be in place by 2010. “This is just a planning document,” he said of the proposal. “It’s a vision of how it will work if all the components come together.”

He said he could not predict what the city’s law enforcement leaders would do after the Bloomberg administration leaves at the end of 2009. But he said that Mr. Kelly was concerned that a more robust security system be in place before the World Trade Center area opens for business again.

“The importance of protecting the nation’s financial center will remain,” Mr. Browne said. “And the ability to protect an urban center from a dirty bomb or a nuclear device will also remain.”

Since early 2007, the police have been using technology to read license plates and to check the information against databases, including one for stolen cars. Similarly, they are using closed-circuit TV and radiation-detection equipment in various counterterrorism operations.

For instance, the department owns portable radiation vehicles — known as TRACS, for Tactical Radiation Acquisition and Characterization System — that can detect radiological agents like cesium or cobalt and differentiate between dangerous ones and ones used in products like smoke detectors or medical devices.

Operation Sentinel would synchronize the three forms of technology — photographs, license plate readers and radiation detectors — in one system.

But there are hurdles. The costs of the project, and its feasibility, have not been fully determined. The Lower Manhattan Security Initiative is a $90 million program; the Securing the Cities program is being paid for with federal money, including $40 million earmarked in the 2008 fiscal year 2008 and $30 million expected the following year. Also, tracking many thousands of vehicles and people every day raises alarm with civil libertarians.

However, Steven Emerson, executive director of the Investigative Project on Terrorism in Washington, a nonprofit research organization that investigates terror groups worldwide, said that the tactics would not invade people’s privacy and that they were critically important, given plots to attack Lower Manhattan.

“It is one tool of ensuring that if there is somebody on a terrorist watch list or someone driving erratically, or if a pattern develops that raises suspicions, it gives them an opportunity to investigate further and — if need be — track down the drivers or the passengers,” he said. “The bottom line is they can’t frisk everybody coming into Manhattan; they cannot wand everyone, as they do at airports. This is a passive collection of data that is not as personally invasive as what they do at airports.”

Operation Sentinel calls for the cameras, license plate readers and radiological scanners to be deployed at seven vehicle crossings: the Brooklyn-Battery, Holland, Lincoln and Queens-Midtown Tunnels, and the George Washington, Henry Hudson and Triborough Bridges.

Mr. Browne said the plan was to include every crossing, including the smaller bridges connecting the Bronx and Upper Manhattan like the Willis Avenue and Macombs Dam Bridges.

A major challenge is to develop technology to discern the radiological signature of vehicles across several lanes at a toll plaza, where many enter at once, and to have the ability to align that data with the correct closed-circuit image and license plate.

“That is the principal challenge they are looking to resolve,” Mr. Browne said.

[snowychap]

Fears over privacy as police expand surveillance project

Database to hold details of millions of journeys for five years

The police are to expand a car surveillance operation that will allow them to record and store details of millions of daily journeys for up to five years, the Guardian has learned.

A national network of roadside cameras will be able to "read" 50m licence plates a day, enabling officers to reconstruct the journeys of motorists.

Police have been encouraged to "fully and strategically exploit" the database, which is already recording the whereabouts of 10 million drivers a day, during investigations ranging from counter-terrorism to low-level crime.

But it has raised concerns from civil rights campaigners, who question whether the details should be kept for so long, and want clearer guidance on who might have access to the material.

The project relies on automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) cameras to pinpoint the precise time and location of all vehicles on the road. Senior officers had promised the data would be stored for two years. But responding to inquiries under the Freedom of Information Act, the Home Office has admitted the data is now being kept for five years.

Thousands of CCTV cameras across the country have been converted to read ANPR data, capturing people's movements in cars on motorways, main roads, airports and town centres.

Local authorities have since adapted their own CCTV systems to capture licence plates on behalf of police, massively expanding the network of available cameras. Mobile cameras have been installed in patrol cars and unmarked vehicles parked by the side of roads.

Police helicopters have been equipped with infrared cameras that can read licence plates from 610 metres (2,000ft).

In four months' time, when a nationwide network of cameras is fully operational, the National ANPR Data Centre in Hendon, north London, will record up to 50m licence plates a day.

The Home Office said in a letter that the Hendon database would "store all ANPR captured data for five years". The photograph of a person's licence plate will, in most cases, be stored for one year.

Human rights group Privacy International last night described the five-year record of people's car journeys "unnecessary and disproportionate", and said it had lodged an official complaint with the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO), the government's data watchdog.

In a statement, the ICO said it would take the complaint "seriously" and would be contacting police "to discuss proposed data retention periods". "Prolonged retention would need to be clearly justified based on continuing value not on the mere chance it may come in useful," it said.

In 2005 the government invested £32m to develop the ANPR data-sharing programme after police concluded that road traffic cameras could be used for counter-terrorism and everyday criminal investigations. Senior police officers have said they intend the database to be integrated into "mainstream policing".

Half of all police forces in England and Wales have now been connected to the network, reading between 8 and 10m licence plates a day. The Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo) said the database would be linked to ANPR systems run by all but two police forces by the end of the year. The database will be able to store as many as 18 bn licence plate sightings in 2009.

The Acpo ANPR strategy document, obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, envisages the database will be used at all levels of policing. The document, which sets policy up until 2010, states that police forces should "fully and strategically exploit" the database.

Officers can access the database to find uninsured cars, locate illegal "duplicate" licence plates and track the movements of criminals. The Acpo adds that the database will "deter criminals through increased likelihood of detection".

"Experience has shown there are very strong links between illegal use of motor vehicles on the road and other types of serious crime," said Merseyside Police's Assistant Chief Constable, Simon Byrne, who leads Acpo's ANPR policy.

The director of Privacy International, Simon Davies, said last night the database would give police "extraordinary powers of surveillance". "This would never be allowed in any other democratic country," he said. "This is possibly one of the most valuable reserves of data imaginable."

Peter Fry, of the CCTV User group, said that licence plate images captured by CCTV are generally retained for 31 days. "There's not a great deal of logic to explain keeping the same images for five years," he said.

[Richard]

Here

Identity cards could be handed out to children as young as 14, a home office minister has suggested.

The first ID cards are due to be offered to 16 and 17-year-olds from 2010 as part of a plan to introduce the controversial scheme in stages.

But Meg Hillier said the age range was still "up for grabs" and could be lowered "if they prove popular".

She also said the scheme might be too far advanced for the Tories to "unpick" if they came to power in 2010.

Speaking at a "No ID, No Sale" fringe meeting at the Labour Party conference, Ms Hillier said a ministerial working party was considering extending the scheme to younger children and was talking to the universities and youth groups about the idea.

She said she had been "struck" by a visit to Hungary, where 14-year-olds routinely carried ID cards - and she pointed out that six-year-olds were already fingerprinted for visas.

The Conservatives and Lib Dems have both said they would scrap the ID card scheme, which they say will cost too much and threatens civil liberties.

But Ms Hillier said the Tories would find it difficult to "devalidate" the cards that had already been issued and scrap the database that was also being used for passports.

"There isn't an easy way to unpick this scheme, quite rightly because it is invaluable."

She also hit back at suggestions by anti-ID card campaigners that the scheme might not go ahead.

"it is full steam ahead," she told the meeting, "in fact the prime minister wanted me to do it quicker than it was possible."

She said, at £30, the cards would be cheaper than passports, which they would probably replace passports altogether at some point in the future.

James Lowman, of the Association of Convenience Stores, said his organisation backed ID cards but wanted government to take the lead in changing the culture so that people would get used to being asked to prove their age.

At the moment, shop workers were being abused and assaulted when they asked for ID from young people trying to buy cigarettes, alcohol, solvents and other age-restricted products, he told the meeting.

Chris Ogden, of the Tobacco Manufacturers' Association, which represents the big cigarette firms, also backed ID cards but said it would persist with its own proof-of-age scheme "until such time as a national identity card is introduced".

Ms Hillier said she would be speaking to the retailers' trade association about ways of helping customers get used to producing their ID cards as proof of age in shops, although she stressed it was "not the primary function" of ID cards.

She doubted whether the UK would ever have a "proof of age" culture similar to the United States, which "dates back to prohibition".

Phil Booth of No2ID said Ms Hiller was "delusional" if she thought ID cards could not be scrapped by an incoming Conservative government.

"The officials themselves, since 2006 have designed the contract on the basis that the entire scheme could be canned at the next election."

"It could simply be downgraded so it is just for passports," he told the BBC News website.

Mr Booth, who had been due to speak at the fringe meeting but was unable to gain entry to the conference centre because of a problem with his pass application, also criticised the plan to give the cards to younger children.

He said ID cards legislation specified a minimum age of 16 and he said it was wrong for young people to be tied into a giant database "for the rest of their lives".

On his conference pass problems, he said: "If this is how they are organising their ID for their own party conference, how the heck are they going to organise ID cards for 50 million people?"

[Gringo]

Row continues as Smith unveils identity card

Jacqui Smith, the home secretary, on Thursday unveiled the new identity card in a move aimed at injecting the government’s controversial multi-billion pound scheme with fresh momentum.

The credit-card sized devices containing biometric data stored on a security chip will be issued from November on a compulsory basis to foreign nationals from outside the European Economic Area applying for leave to remain in the UK. It will be linked initially to existing government data storage systems.

Ministers predict that up to 60,000 cards will be issued by the end of next March, with the first phase of the scheme targeting sectors suspected of abusing the immigration system, such as foreign students and people claiming the right to stay through marriage.

"Oi darkie, come over here and show us your ID card."

"I don't need to carry one"

"Oh ok sir, on your way then"

What is the point of making ID cards mandatory for a subsection of the community? How do you force people to carry them? Do you arrest every 'suspect' without one until they can prove they don't have to carry one? Does this force everyone to carry their passports with them, thus making ID cards easier to swallow? Well no, not everyone of course, just those without nice pink skintones.

And of course it prevents 'ID theft' as your data is secure with them.

Personnel records stolen from MoD

The Ministry of Defence (MoD) is investigating the theft of computer files with the records of thousands of serving and former RAF staff on.

The information was stored on computer hard drives at the Service Personnel and Veterans Agency at the RAF Innsworth site near Gloucester.

The theft of the files took place on 17 September, within a high-security area on the base.

The MoD has set up a helpline for people who have been affected.

It said it was treating the breach "extremely seriously".

900,000 personnel

A spokesman for the MoD police said: "We can confirm that an investigation is being conducted by MoD police, with the support of Gloucestershire Police into the apparent theft of three USB portable hard disk drives.

[snowychap]

No need for papers, Midas is on its way:

Police will use new device to take fingerprints in street

Every police force in the UK is to be equipped with mobile fingerprint scanners - handheld devices that allow police to carry out identity checks on people in the street.

The new technology, which ultimately may be able to receive pictures of suspects, is likely to be in widespread use within 18 months. Tens of thousands of sets - as compact as BlackBerry smartphones - are expected to be distributed.

The police claim the scheme, called Project Midas, will transform the speed of criminal investigations. A similar, heavier machine has been tested during limited trials with motorway patrols.

To address fears about mass surveillance and random searches, the police insist fingerprints taken by the scanners will not be stored or added to databases.

Liberty, the civil rights group, cautioned that the law required fingerprints taken in such circumstances to be deleted after use. Gareth Crossman, Liberty's policy director, said: "Saving time with new technology could help police performance but officers must make absolutely certain that they take fingerprints only when they suspect an individual of an offence and can't establish his identity."

Details of the type of equipment and the scope of its use have been revealed in a presentation by the National Policing Improvement Agency (NPIA).

The initial phase of the Mobile Identification At Scene (Midas) project, costed at £30m-£40m, will enable officers to perform rapid checks on the fingerprints of people arrested or detained. The marks will be compared against records on Ident1, the national police database which holds information on 7.5 million individuals.

Geoff Whitaker, a senior technology officer with the NPIA, told the Biometrics 2008 conference that Project Midas would save enormous amounts of police time and reduce the number of wrongful arrests.

At present, officers have to take suspects to custody suites if they need to check fingerprints. On average, the agency's research shows, the procedure takes 67 minutes. "If we scaled this [saving] up to the national level that would equate to 366 additional police officers on the beat," Whitaker said. "One of the benefits is that it will reduce the number of errors - and we can reduce the number of arrests significantly.

"There's a huge range of opportunities [for] mobile ID. It could be used on the deceased at the scene of a crime, on suspects for intelligence in the early part of an investigation, [or even] in a mortuary."

Policing of big public occasions, sporting events, festivals, political conferences - as a well as immigration and border controls - could benefit from the equipment, he suggested.

"Another use is for prisoners in transit; it's not uncommon for prisoners to swap identities on the way to prison," he said.

Project Midas, he said, would give the police "a full, mobile national capability" to check identities.

The system is being designed to have the capacity to beam images of suspects back to officers on the streets to help confirm identifications. Some US police forces are already using the technology.

"The return of mugshots [to officers]," Whitaker added, "is something we would like to do."

The tender document for Midas states: "Bidders' solutions ... should include, but may not be limited to, fingerprint identification capability." Plans for a police Facial Images National Database (Find) were suspended last year but are being reviewed.

One of the companies bidding for the Midas contract, Northrop Grumman, told the Guardian: "A lot of the hand-held [devices] we are considering have cameras so they can support fingerprint and facial images".

A limited trial of mobile police fingerprint devices, called Project Lantern, started in 2006. About 200 have been distributed and 30,000 checks performed. They were deployed in police cars using automatic number plate recognition technology - stopping vehicles that were logged as stolen, having no insurance, no MOT or simply unknown.

"The aim was to deny criminals the use of the roads," said Whitaker. "Around 60% of drivers stopped gave false identification details."

Fingerprint checks often showed they were carrying falsified documents.

The electronic searches, encrypted and sent over public networks, were usually returned to the mobile devices within two minutes; 97% of searches were completed in five minutes. Responses are graded as "high" or "medium". If high, it shows the system is confident of a match; if medium, it could display up to three potential identities. The returned data includes the name, age and gender of the suspect if there is a match.

A spokeswoman for the NPIA added: "It will be up to each police authority to assess the benefits and see how many they want. Early indications are that the benefits will be huge."

Thomas Smith, an officer from the Los Angeles police department, also briefed the Biometrics 2008 conference on the success of his force's mobile ID devices which send images and fingerprint matches back to officers on the street. He said they had become so powerful that once the machines were produced some suspects admitted they were lying about their identity.

"Our next thing will be facial recognition [computerised matching of suspects from their faces] in the field," he said.