LAHORE: Punjab Information Technology Board (PITB) developed identification tool, Criminal Record Identifier (CRI) installed in most of the police stations in Punjab, has so far recorded seven thousand finger prints in seven months. On average 30-40 individuals get matched per day, it was informed on Thursday.
Officials told Pakistan Today that CRI is a co-product of the Punjab Police and PITB. It is a fingerprint-based identification tool that compares the suspect’s fingerprint with the central database of fingerprints. The central database server contains information on criminals from all over the province. The tool can accurately find 20 million matches per second.
Currently, the CRI being used by the Punjab Police since November last year has so far matched 9258 fingerprints with the police criminal identification record. The system is being actively used in 142 police stations of the major cities of the Punjab province. So far 67812 finger prints have been gathered.
The officials claimed that the tool has helped in arresting suspected elements as in the recent robbery case in the area of Mansoorabad where a habitual robber with three criminal index cards was arrested.
Officials said that PITB and Punjab police were constantly working to add more powerful features to CRI that will make this tool even more useful in future.
They said that Sindh Police has already started digitization of their criminal records.
The officials also pointed out that soon Sindh and Punjab police would be sharing their database of criminals. PITB implemented Criminal Record Management System and established an independent server for Sindh Police in order to record and identify criminals on the basis of their biometric details.
They said that over 50 thousand criminal cards have been digitized and registered into this newly established system. In the case of adaptation of this technology by other provinces and the federal capital, the criminals could be identified from all over the country from any station. They said that the use of CRI would help to reduce the crime rate in the entire country.