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USA: Next Generation ID: EPIC Prevails in Case Against FBI re: Next Generation ID

17 November 2014

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"A federal court has ruled that EPIC "substantially prevailed" in an open government lawsuit against the FBI for information on the agency's massive biometric database. The court also awarded attorneys' fees to EPIC, finding that "There can be little dispute that the general public has a genuine, tangible interest in a system designed to store and manipulate significant quantities of its own biometric data, particularly given the great numbers of people from whom such data will be gathered."

EPIC's lawsuit led to the disclosure of hundreds of pages about "Next Generation Identification," a vast FBI database program including fingerprints, DNA profiles, iris scans, palm prints, voice identification profiles and photographs of millions of Americans suspected of no crime. The documents received through EPIC's lawsuit revealed the FBI's acceptance of a 20% error rate for the NGI database's facial recognition software. Technical specifications for another facial recognition project revealed that the FBI extended access to the biometric database to state and local law enforcement for the purpose of running facial recognition queries."

See: Next Generation ID: EPIC Prevails in Case Against FBI re: Next Generation ID (EPIC link)

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