CHENNAI: In an effort to speed up breakthroughs in crime cases, the Tamil Nadu Finger Print Bureau is on the path of upgrading the existing software to Fingerprint Analysis Tracking System (FACTS) version 7 at police stations across the State.
This would allow the police to have direct access to the centralised fingerprint server for easy and swift tracing of the offender.
If everything goes as planned, from this October, police stations would be equipped with the upgraded software. Soon, they would also be integrated with the Crime and Criminal Tracking Network and Systems (CCTNS), a nationwide online tracking system by integrating more than 14,000 police stations across the country.
“Through this, every station can access two servers simultaneously to identify the offender as well as access the history of the person,” said a senior police officer.
A senior official with the State Crime Records Bureau said, currently only four lakh imprints are stored but with the new software up to 60 lakh imprints could be stored. With the upgraded version, both roll prints (imprint from one nail to another nail is taken) and tap prints could be recorded.
He said the TN government had approved FACTS version 7 for Chennai by May and in October in every police station in the State. Every police station would be provided with a user name and password through which the imprints could be uploaded to the server. Earlier, imprints would be sent to every district fingerprint bureau and then to the main bureau in Chennai which would upload them to the server.
Soon we would approach to government to integrate the system with the National Automated Fingerprint Identification System (NAFIS), enabling officials to track inter-state offenders.