The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is constantly looking for new ways to improve their crime fighting and discover wanted men and women sooner. According to a press release, they are trying out a new technology that allows police to detect wanted suspects using facial recognition software. The FBI has already caught one double homicide suspect using the technology, and plans to install it in many more police ventures in the future.

When the FBI learned that a wanted Californian with the initials R.C. moved to North Carolina, they scanned his 1991 booking photo into a software program. Now that his faced was logged in, they used the recognition software to find his DMV license photo, which was stored in the North Carolina DMV database. They narrowed their files to about 50 people who looked like their wanted criminal. With those people's picture and information, the FBI continued researching and located a man who was operating under a pseudonym. The FBI then located this person and made an arrest, thankful to have found R.C.

Facial recognition software isn't a brand new invention. In fact it is now used on millions of home computers for all sorts of activities. Yet the U.S. does not commonly use the software to arrest criminals. Many privacy protection groups are concerned that the new technology could have a crippling effect on people's personal privacy. No one wants to know that the FBI could obtain them in minutes with a facial recognition device. One privacy attorney told the press that he believes that using facial recognition technology in crime scene investigations means that people are participating in a criminal lineup whenever they get their driver's license.

He believes that the facial recognition technology could become a problem, especially with lookalikes who may be mistaken for wanted criminals. These wrongly accused individuals would have probably been left alone if it wasn't for the fact that they were detected with facial recognition. This opinionated attorney says that licenses are supposed to be a card which gives an American citizen permission to drive. Now they are needed to open up any sort of bank account, and are required to dozens of identification purposes. And soon, he worries that they are going to become a part of a law enforcement database.

According MSNBC, the North Carolina project wasn't actually carried out by the FBI. They needed the DMV's permission to even complete the project, and the software was used at a DMV office. The FBI does not have permission to collect and store photos into a database, though the DMV has been doing so for years. Even so, sources say that the FBI is hoping to use facial recognition more often in the future, along with biometric information like fingerprints, DNA. Iris patterns in the eye, voices, scents, and even how a person walks. The FBI has even appointed a panel to further look into how to use the software.

They hope that they can maximize the potential of this crime fighting scheme. They believe that it will take at least a year to establish the license photo standards. Currently, many DMVs do not allow their future licensed drivers to smile when they are getting their picture taken, so that the pictures will have a closer face match with other photos such as mug shots. The photo can software is incredibly accurate, even accounting for the width of a chin or the structure of cheekbones to discover a criminal. One suspect had undergone a sex change, and the software was still able to identify him. As the FBI continues to develop this software, attorneys will need to brush up on their knowledge of privacy laws, and gear up to defend men and women who might just be the innocent doppelganger of a wanted criminal.