2017 International Conference on Innovations in Information, Embedded and Communication Systems (ICIIECS)
Use of AADHAAR Biometric Database for Crime
Investigation - Opportunity and Challenges
Dr. Manish Kumar1
Asst. Professor, Dept. of Computer Applications,
M. S. Ramaiah Institute of Technology,
Bangalore-560 054, INDIA
E-Mail:- manishkumarjsr@yahoo.com
Dr. T. V. Suresh Kumar3
Professor & Head, Dept. of Computer Applications,
M. S. Ramaiah Institute of Technology, Bangalore-560 054, INDIA
E-Mail:-tvsureshkumarmsrit@gmail.com
Abstract—Now biometric technique is a front line security
measure for both identity verification and crime detection. It’s a
century old techniques and become an integral part of almost all
crime investigation. In recent day’s lots of advanced techniques,
Software and Hardware system has been developed to improve
the accuracy and performance of the Biometric Identification
System for Crime Investigation. In this paper we are discussing
how Aadhaar Biometric Database can be used for tracing
criminal and crime investigation. Aadhaar is a Unique
Identification Numbers (UID) provided by The Unique
Identification Authority of India to Indian Citizens.
Index Terms—Aadhaar, Unique Identification Authority of
India (UIDAI), Biometric, Iris, Fingerprint.
I.INTRODUCTION
Fingerprints analysis is one of the most vital and integral
process in crime investigation. Fingerprint databases are
commonly used worldwide by almost all the police department
and law enforcement agencies for the purposes of forensics,
crime investigation and identifying the criminal’s involvements
in various crimes.
In India, it’s a challenging task for investigators to fish out
fingerprints of criminals which often get lost or lay hidden in
piles of files in police stations because no attempt has been
made to put them in one database.
For the country like India, having world second largest
population, it’s really a very difficult to architect a separate
biometric or identity database for different-different purposes
individually. As 90% of Indian population has enrolled in
Aadhaar, It become a standard biometric database which can
be used for various purposes including the crime investigation.
In this paper, we will examine how Aadhaar biometric
database can be used for crime investigation and how it can be
integrated with the existing system in India, the challenges of
integration, and possible solutions. Paper also highlights some
of the technical and legal challenges for its implementation,
which is a policy matter.
‹,(((
Dr. M. Hanumanthappa2
Professor, Dept. of Computer Science and Applications,
Jnana Bharathi Campus, Bangalore University,
Bangalore -560 056, INDIA
E-mail:- hanu6572@hotmail.com
II.NATIONAL IDENTITY PROJECTS IN OTHER JURISDICTIONS
Today all most all the countries are providing some kind of
Nation Identity to their citizens. Some country has very
advanced state-of-the art technologies where as some of them
are still developing it. This section will discuss in short about
different kind of National Identity Projects implemented in few
countries.
A. United States
Social Security number (SSN) is a nine-digit number issued
to U.S. citizens, permanent residents, and temporary (working)
residents.
The Social Security number (SSN) was created in 1936 for
the sole purpose of tracking the earnings histories
of U.S. workers, for use in determining Social Security benefit
entitlement and computing benefit levels. Since then, use of
the SSN has expanded substantially. Today the SSN may be
the most commonly used numbering system in the United
States.
B. United Kingdom
The Identity Cards Act was introduced on 11th September,
2001, amidst rising concerns about identity theft and the
misuse of public services. The card was to be used to obtain
social security services, but the ability to properly identify a
person to their true identity was central to the proposal, with
wider implications for prevention of crime and terrorism. The
cards were linked to a central database (the National Identity
Register), which would store information about all of the
holders of the cards. The Act specified 50 different categories
of information that the NIR could hold, It includes, digitised
facial scan, iris scan and up to 10 fingerprints scan.
C. Estonia
Estonia has one of the most highly developed national ID
card system. The national ID card system in Estonia gives their
citizens secure digital access to various services. The card uses
 2017 International Conference on Innovations in Information, Embedded and Communication Systems (ICIIECS)
2048-bit public key encryption and legally equivalent to a
manual signature.
D. France
The biometric ID card was to include a compulsory chip
containing personal information, such as fingerprints, a
photograph, home address, eye colour etc. A second, optional
chip was to be implemented for online authentication and
electronic signatures, to be used for e-government services and
e-commerce. The law was passed with the purpose of
combating “identity fraud”.
E. Argentina
Documento Nacional de Identidad or DNI (which means
National Identity Document) is the main identity document for
Argentine citizens, as well as temporary or permanent resident.
The basic objective of DNIe is to digitally certify the
identity of the person, allow the electronic signature of
documents and gives the possibility to use the electronic
identity in digital services.
The card is issued to the citizens at birth and updated at the
age of 8 and 14. The DNI is a valid travel document for
entering Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador,
Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay, and Venezuela.
F. India
The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) was
constituted in 2009 with the objective to issue Unique
Identification numbers (UID), named as “Aadhaar” to Indian
Citizens. It’s a 12-digit unique identity number. With the help
of 10 fingerprint scan and iris scan of the individuals, system
ensures no duplication in generating UID. It is considered as
one of the world largest national ID project. The whole system
is designed in such a way that it can be easily verified by
Government and Non-Government services. The system has
been promoted as a tool for reducing fraud in many private and
public distribution system and enabling the government to
better deliver public benefits.
In this section we discussed about the National Identity
project in few countries. Some of these projects could not be
implemented because of some legal complexity or lack of
support from citizens and law makers. However in many
countries citizen identity card system is implemented
successfully and it has given fruitful results to government as
well as citizens both.
Implementation of National Level Citizens Identity system
is huge task. It requires enormous effort and financial support.
Many times such national level identity systems are used for
multiple purposes and it’s quite obvious that such system
cannot be developed for individual and specific purposes.
These systems generally stores citizen’s basic information as
well as their biometric information and normally its built in
such a way that it can be used for multiple purposes. In many
countries such systems are used for identifying the forgery, tax
evasion and crime investigation. Our objective is to explore,
how such system can be used for law enforcement and crime
investigation. Next section discuss about the use of biometric
system for crime investigation.
III.USE OF BIOMETRIC DATABASE FOR CRIME INVESTIGATION
Today a massive computing power and well written pattern
matching algorithms have made it possible to automatically
search and detect the patterns of similarity in many different
kind of digital database of patterns which may include
fingerprints, faces, and irises. Effectiveness and accuracy of
such system are very promising even for a very large
databases. These kind of technologies are continuously
evolving and offering a potential edge to the law-enforcement
agencies. Many countries has developed a separate biometric
database for this purpose, where as many of them have linked it
with their National Identity database for effective analysis
[2][13].
The Federal Bureau of Investigation, United States
maintains the largest database of faces. The FBI has 548
million pictures catalog of searchable “face photos” which
includes criminal mug shots, photos of terrorists taken by
soldiers in Afghanistan and, more recently, state driver’s
license and ID photos of ordinary citizens who have committed
no crime at all.
Nearly a decade ago, feared by another 9/11- style attack,
FBI signed a $1 billion contract with Lockheed Martin to
develop a Next Generation Identification (NGI) system.
Initially a pilot program was launched by FBI in 2011. In late
2014, the facial recognition program finally became fully
operational. The technology essentially measures minute
distances in a person’s face and logs the information. While
these methods and techniques are still in their infancy, it could
help law enforcement agencies to locate and identify a suspect
using surveillance videos, mug shots or even photos taken from
social network sites like Facebook and Twitter.
Similar to FBI, Fingerprint Analysis and Criminal Tracing
System (FACTS) is an advanced Automated Fingerprint
Identification System used in India. The system supports
storing of fingerprints of convicted, arrested, absconding
criminals in the database and supports performing automatic
fingerprint searches against the existing criminal database. The
system is designed with the objectives to provide efficient and
effective tool to the investigative agency for faster and
effective way of identifying the criminals.
The National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), Ministry of
Home Affairs, Government of India has planned to develop a
comprehensive online database of fingerprints of criminals and
convicts from every state by 2017, a project that will help
improve investigation and prosecution all over the country. The
data will be connected to the Criminal and Criminal Tracking
Network & Systems (CCTNS), a nationwide integrated online
system conceived after the 2008 Mumbai terrorist attacks to
track crimes and offenders.
IV.UNIQUE IDENTIFICATION AUTHORITY OF INDIA
The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) is a
statutory authority established under the provisions of
the Aadhaar Act, 2016 by the Government of India. Prior to its
establishment as a statutory authority, UIDAI was functioning
as an attached office of the then Planning Commission.
 2017 International Conference on Innovations in Information, Embedded and Communication Systems (ICIIECS)

UIDAI was created with the objective to issue Unique
Identification numbers (UID), named as "Aadhaar", to all
residents of India.
Aadhaar system is built purely as an “Identity Platform”.
The main purpose of Aadhaar is to provide a biometric
attached identity that is verifiable online. The whole system is
designed in such a way that it can be easily verified by
Government and Non-Government services. The system has
been promoted as a tool for reducing fraud in many private and
public distribution system and enabling the government to
better deliver public benefits.
A. Biometrics Database in Aadhaar
The Aadhaar biometric system design has followed global
best practices and currently considered to be the state-of-the-
art. Aadhaar system has used the iris biometric in addition to
fingerprint and face biometrics to achieve de-duplication
accuracy in excess of 99% and also ensure total inclusion.
UIDAI capture the following, biometrics for the enrollment:
• 10 finger prints
• 2 iris scans
• Photograph of face
V.PERFORMANCE MEASUREMENT OF BIOMETRIC
IDENTIFICATION SYSTEM
The main aspect to evaluate a biometric system is its
accuracy. From the user’s point of view, an error of accuracy
occurs when the system fails to authenticate the identity of a
registered person or when the system erroneously authenticates
the identity of an intruder[8][9][11].
A biometric matching system’s response is typically a
matching score ‘s’ that quantifies the similarity between the
input and the database template representations. The higher the
score, the more certain the system is that the two biometric
measurements come from the same person. A threshold t
regulates the system decision. The system infers that pairs of
biometric samples generating scores higher than or equal to t
are mate pairs (that is, they belong to the same person)[10].
Consequently, pairs of biometric samples generating scores
lower than t are nonmate pairs (that is, they belong to different
persons)[4][5]. The distribution of scores generated from pairs
of samples from different persons is called an impostor
distribution; the score distribution generated from pairs of
samples from the same person is called a genuine distribution
(see Figure 1).

UIDAI has used three ABIS (Automatic Biometric

Identification System) software solution to perform biometric
de-duplication as a risk mitigation strategy. De-duplication at
this scale (1.2 billion residents) had not been previously
attempted anywhere in the world. Aadhaar is the first ever
multi-ABIS system implemented in the world, and brings
significant advantages. Aadhaar system not only assure highest
accuracy, it’s also provide a very reliable and scalable service.
B. Scalable Architecture
Aadhaar is developed to provide unique identity to more
than a billion people. With an aggressive target of reaching 600
million Aadhaars in a short span of 4 years meant that about 1
million Aadhaars need to be generated every day. Processing
of every enrolment requires matching 10 fingerprints, both
irises, and demographics with every existing record in the
Figure 1:- Biometric system error rates
database. Currently, with the Aadhaar database at 600 million,
processing 1 million enrolments every day roughly translates to
There are several factors that can provoke accuracy errors.
about 600 trillion biometric matches every day. On the other
Biometrical Error rates are quantitative metrics of the accuracy
hand, authentication is expected to perform within sub-seconds
of biometrical systems. They help biometric researchers and
even when authentication volume is few 100 million requests
industry providers to improve their solutions and help system
every day.
users to evaluate and choose the appropriate solutions for their
All this requires entire system and supporting processes to
applications. There are two types of error metrics: (a) to
scale to massive levels. Aadhaar system has already
evaluate capture devices. (b) to evaluate biometric algorithms.
demonstrated the scale by reaching 600+ million Aadhaars,
The Failure to Capture Rate (FCR) evaluates the capacity
processes 1 million enrolments every day, manages about 4000
of a capture device to properly read a biometrical record in
terabytes of data, and has deployed authentication services to
several environmental and human conditions. The failure of
handle 100 million authentications every day.
capture device is known as "Capture Error". For biometric
As we are proposing the use of Aadhaar biometric database
algorithms evaluation there are metrics associated to each
for criminal identification and crime investigation, it’s very
phase of the recognizing process[14].
important to review the accuracy of such system. Next section
The Failure to Enroll Rate (FER) measures the capacity of
discusses a very common technique for biometric performance
Enroll Component of the algorithm to detect, extract and
evaluation [12].
compose the template from the biometric record read by the
 2017 International Conference on Innovations in Information, Embedded and Communication Systems (ICIIECS)
capture device, i.e, the FER is computed only for biometric
record properly read.
In the case of matching algorithm we have two important
error rates: The False Matching Error Rate (FMR) measures
the rate of actual impostor comparisons that are erroneously
considered genuines. On the contrary the False Non matching
Error Rate (FNMR) measures the rate of actual genuine
comparisons that are erroneously considered impostors.
In the case of ranking algorithm the main ranking error rate
is the Rank (n) that measures the rate of genuine comparisons
be included among the n most similar comparisons from a
database[1][3][7].
An operational biometric system makes a trade-off
between false match rate (FMR) and false nonmatch rate
(FNMR). In fact, both FMR and FNMR are functions of the
system threshold t: If the system’s designers decrease t to make
the system more tolerant to input variations and noise, FMR
increases [6]. On the other hand, if they raise t to make the
system more secure, then FNMR increases accordingly.
System performance can be depicted at all operating points
(thresholds t) in the form of a receiver operating characteristic
(ROC) curve. An ROC curve plots FMR against (1 – FNMR)
or FNMR for various values of threshold t (see Figure 2).
Figure 2:- Receiver operating characteristic curve
VI.PERFORMANCE OF AADHAAR BIOMETRIC SYSTEM
As fingerprints alone will not be sufficient for achieving
higher accuracy in biometric identification, Aadhaar has used
multi-model biometric fusion techniques. UIDAI has achieved
accuracy as high as 99% de-duplication due to the fusion of
fingerprint and iris scores.
A Proof of Concept (PoC) study was carried out by UIDAI
to assess the feasibility of using iris for on-line biometric
authentication in the Indian context (Table 1). The findings of
this study are presented in the report. This report covers the
design framework, field implementation, data collection and
analysis. It interprets empirical results to assess effectiveness of
iris technology, authentication processes and devices [12].
TABLE I. FEASIBILITY OF IRIS BASED ON-LINE AUTHENTICATION
% of Residents
Findings Single-Eye Dual-Eye
Cameras Cameras
Authenticated in 95.89 99.29
first try
Authenticated in 99.21 99.40
multiple tries
Failed 0.79 0.60
authentication
(FRR+FTC)
VII.CRIMINAL TRACING SYSTEM USING AADHAAR
First of all it’s very important to discuss, why we proposed
the use of Aadhaar biometric database for criminal tracing?
One of the reasons behind use of Aadhaar biometric database
is, it has highest number of citizen enrollment with a great
accuracy. Building a similar system for law and order will
require a huge effort, time and money which are already
invested to build the system like Aadhaar and it’s a great
success.
In India all most all the state government police department
do have some kind of their own local database of convicted
criminals and history sheeter.
The National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) has planned
to develop a comprehensive online database of fingerprints of
criminals and convicts from every state by 2017, a project that
will help improve investigation and prosecution all over the
country. The data will be connected to the Criminal and
Criminal Tracking Network & Systems (CCTNS), a
nationwide integrated online system conceived after the 2008
Mumbai terrorist attacks to track crimes and offenders.
Normally whenever any crime occurs, police department
take the help of forensics experts to scan and preserve the
fingerprints founds at the crime scene. These fingerprints play
a vital role for the conviction of criminal as it is one of crucial
evidence. State police department normally maintain a local
database of these fingerprints collected during the investigation
of various cases. Sometime this database helps the police to
crack many other cases, if the same criminal is involved in
multiple cases. However this biometric database maintained by
police department is useful for investigating those cases where
the criminals are repeated offender. However, if the people
involved in the crime are first time offender or a migrated
offender, who has moved from some other state or place, the
local police biometrics database may be of no use for
investigation. In such case, where the criminals are first time
offender or a migrated criminals, centralize biometric database
can be a great resource for investigation.
Building a separate biometric database only for such
purpose and enrolling such a huge population in this system
will be a very costly affair and tedious process and may not be
a feasible solution. As an alternate Aadhaar biometric database
can be the best suited option for this purpose. The proposed
system architecture (Figure 3) show the overall process flow of
the system.
 2017 International Conference on Innovations in Information, Embedded and Communication Systems (ICIIECS)
In normal process, whenever any criminal incidents are
reported, police department with the help of forensic experts
collect fingerprints from the crime scene. Police department
analyses these fingerprints and if it is matches with any
fingerprints in the existing local biometric database of police
department, then it’s easy for the police to identify the
criminals as most likely the records of such criminal may be
available with the police. If the fingerprints do not match with
the local database then it can be forwarded to central finger
print database, which is a repository database of all the states
fingerprint database. The central biometric database can be
useful, if the criminals are repeated offenders and migrated.
However, if the criminals are first time offenders then central
database may be of no use and hence it can be analyzed with
the help of Aadhaar database.
VIII.ERROR TOLERANCE AND CASE OF MISTAKEN IDENTITY
What happens when the match turns out to be wrong?
Though, the Aadhaar biometric performance is more than 99%.
In Indian context error rate between 0.25% - 1% is a huge
number. It will falsely identify 10-11 Million people as a
suspect.
One of the advantage of Aadhaar database is, it also store
the demographic information of the enrolled citizens. In the
case of false identification, demographic information can be
used as a filter to reduce the false identification.
Figure 3:- Architecture of Aadhaar Based Criminal Tracing System
IX.USE OF AADHAAR BIOMETRIC DATABASE- OPPORTUNITY
AND CHALLENGES
No doubt such kind of huge centralize biometric database like
Aadhaar gives lot more opportunity in application point of
view but it also raises some challenges and its worth
mentioning here. It looks very simple to use Aadhaar for
criminal tracing purpose but it has some technical and legal
hurdles.
A. Opportunity and Advantages
Aadhaar has highest number of citizen enrollment till
today. It’s one of the largest systems in the world storing such
a huge number of Biometric information. The system is very
reliable and scalable. Building similar type of system only for
forensic and criminal investigation purpose may not be feasible
and viable solution. Since Aadhaar is already well established
system, its uses for the other purposes can be explored.
B. Legal Hurdle
Aadhaar was never intended for Forensic purpose and thus
it was not designed in that way. The citizens who enrolled for
Aadhaar never gave his consent of using his information for
such investigations.
C. Technical Challenge
If we study the UIDAI’s own technical report, the system
has approximately a chance of 0.5 per cent occurrence of false
identification. In Indian context this fractional values could
possibly make Lakhs of people as Suspect. We can narrow
 2017 International Conference on Innovations in Information, Embedded and Communication Systems (ICIIECS)

down this number but still chances are there that innocent may
suffer, if the investigative agency solely depends on the system
identification process.
Now though the system has some legal hurdles and
technical challenges, it seems there is no other alternatives
better than the Aadhaar.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
[13]V. Nagaraju and L. Fiondella, "A survey of homeland security
biometrics and forensics research," 2016 IEEE Symposium on
Technologies for Homeland Security (HST), Waltham, MA,
2016, pp. 1-7.
[14]Z. u. H. Usmani, S. Irum, H. Afzal and S. Mahmud, "How to
Build an Automated Fingerprint Identification System," 2013
International Symposium on Biometrics and Security
Technologies, Chengdu, 2013, pp. 40-47.

I would like to thank MSRIT Management and my colleagues

for their valuable suggestion, constant support and
encouragement.
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