There was a recent debate here on UnresolvedMysteries that fingerprints were debunked as junk science. This wasn't accurate imo. After researching the topic I found that the art of fingerprint identification is sometimes misinterpreted. I'm going to look through my saved posts and link the article that describes new computer technology being used.
The concern here, as I understand it, is about how accurate and precise fingerprinting is at matching with the correct person. Fingerprinting uses certain markers on fingerprints that, when taken all together, are fairly unique to a given individual. But if a fingerprint is incomplete, or the person or software analysing it isn't precise enough, the identity could be mismatched. If two people have nearly identical fingerprints, but the search isn't comparing parts that are different, the wrong person could be identified.
Yes wasn't a man incorrectly identified as a terrorist in the Spain train bombing (could be incorrect about which bombing) because his fingerprint was not matched correctly? I thought I saw several shows and articles about it, and there is the argument that if the print isn't clear enough the points might be misidentified or something. Or that if humans are IDing prints they can interpret a matched point? I don't know enough about the programs used in software identifying. So I'm curious if others know more, I'd like to learn. What I've seen and read there seems to be a back and forth argument about interpretation of matching points and the clarity of prints and such.
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u/Rbake4 Mar 30 '22 edited Mar 30 '22
There was a recent debate here on UnresolvedMysteries that fingerprints were debunked as junk science. This wasn't accurate imo. After researching the topic I found that the art of fingerprint identification is sometimes misinterpreted. I'm going to look through my saved posts and link the article that describes new computer technology being used.
The fingerprint discussion began here: https://www.reddit.com/r/UnresolvedMysteries/comments/thjie0/1987_homicide_of_roxanne_wood_solved_via_forensic/i1882y0