what are the advantages and limitations of fingerprinting?

Question

Or is there any good websites i could use?

Answer 1

Very few agencies use the "points of comparison" sytem any more, including the Scottish fingerprint service mentioned by an earlier answer. After the Shirley McKie case the Scottish system has now followed the English and gone over to "holistic" identification. In addition, AFIS is widely used (Automated Fingerprint Identification System) so human error is substantially removed.
Advantage is that fingerprints are unique, disadvantage is that they can be identified only by comparison with prints held on a database or taken from a suspect. This of course is also true of DNA.

Answer 2

'No two individuals posses the same fingerprints' . This would seem to be a 100% foolproof method of identification.
In fact criminals (being inconsiderate) sometimes leave partial or smudged prints at the CS. Then it is up to 'experts' to match the print with those of the suspect. They do this using 'points of identification' or a number of matches between the two prints.
The criteria for these numbers of 'points of identification' varies from country to country.
I believe in a notorius Scottish case guilt, was 'proven' on the basis of eight points and that itself on a 'cropped' photograph of the original print. The case was overturned thanks to expert evidence from other fingerprint specialists who used more rigorous identification procedures(16 points of ID I think). This would argue that in cases like these, for successful prosecution, fingerprint evidence should not be used as the sole corroborating evidence

Answer 3

apparently, no two finger prints are the same, apart from koala bear's finger prints being exactly like humans, and the rare occurence, of two human finger prints, actually being the same.
Do you personally know a lottery jackpot winner? No, but they exist.(as do indentical finger prints)
So lets hope, with often, only partial fingerprints being used in court (and there have been appeals, on the grounds that the dury have not been told these are only partial finger prints tendered in evidence) that a criminal koala doesnt commit any offences in your name!
on the same subject of physical evidence, and percieved uniqueness, web search for "DNA changes", (and the supposed infalibility of dna). Firstly in parenting cases, being privatly done, and not as important as murder cases, there has been human error, with independant agents simply making up results to save lab costs, genuine sample mix ups, and fraud, on the human, lab/tester/sample level. More importantly, to do with research into organ transplant, there is evidence dna changes after transplant, and further, on research on this, it simply changes, with age, anyway! Interesting stuff!

Answer 4

Advantages: if your children are finger printed and entered into the international system then if they are ever abducted and someone claims to have seen the child in a certain location, they can dust for prints and verify if the child was indeed in that area. It could lead to a quicker recovery. It also makes it easier to catch criminals if their prints are in the computer.
Disadvantages: If you child commits a crime and you are hoping to get them off, if their prints are in the computer the chances are slim. Other than that, I see no disadvantage.

Answer 5

Try a book, tells the history of police and techniques of new scotland yard and the fbi. By the way thats what its called. or
http://www.onin.com/fp/fphistory.html
http://www.policensw.com/info/fingerprints/finger01.html
http://safety-identification-products.com/fingerprint-information.html
http://protist.biology.washington.edu/fingerprint/problems.html

Answer 6

for crime its quite important