WEBVTT - How Fingerprinting Works 0:00:01.080 --> 0:00:04.560 Welcome to Stuff you Should Know from house Stuff Works 0:00:04.559 --> 0:00:13.000 dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh 0:00:13.039 --> 0:00:15.720 Clark and there's Stuffy Chuck Bryant, and there's Jerry and 0:00:15.880 --> 0:00:17.599 there's some papers in front of me, and then I 0:00:17.720 --> 0:00:20.080 key a lamp and a big old microphone and it's 0:00:20.120 --> 0:00:23.599 all pressing in on me really hard. That means this 0:00:23.760 --> 0:00:26.759 is stuff you should know. That means Josh has gone 0:00:26.760 --> 0:00:31.280 on vacations. When the microphone is the size of a watermelon, 0:00:32.760 --> 0:00:34.640 it's just hitting you in the face. Yeah, I'm like, 0:00:34.760 --> 0:00:40.520 it doesn't normally a braid my chin is today. So yeah, Chuck, Josh, 0:00:40.720 --> 0:00:43.720 how are you doing. I'm great. You get some fingerprints there? 0:00:43.760 --> 0:00:47.960 Let me see you. Um, I have four on my 0:00:48.040 --> 0:00:50.800 fingers and one each on each thumb. Yeah, are you're 0:00:50.840 --> 0:00:54.360 one of those guys on um Oh, let me tell 0:00:54.360 --> 0:00:57.840 you a little story about where your little fingerprints came from, 0:00:57.880 --> 0:01:01.480 back when Chuck, little Chuck was just a ten week 0:01:01.560 --> 0:01:07.120 old fetus. Okay, so nineteen seventy it's a certain point 0:01:07.160 --> 0:01:09.400 in nineteen seventy. Well, if I was born in March 0:01:09.520 --> 0:01:11.880 seventy one, and that would go back, just go back 0:01:11.920 --> 0:01:15.400 nine months from there. Okay, whatever that is, uh nine seventy. 0:01:16.200 --> 0:01:21.119 So your your little basil cell layer of your skin. 0:01:21.240 --> 0:01:23.920 You got three. You got the epidermis, the outer layer, 0:01:24.160 --> 0:01:26.679 the basil layer, which is in between that's like that 0:01:26.800 --> 0:01:29.399 where all the new skin cells are produced. Then there's 0:01:29.400 --> 0:01:33.520 a dermist below that. Those are your three layers. About 0:01:33.560 --> 0:01:37.560 that time, your little basil layer started going haywire, producing 0:01:37.600 --> 0:01:41.680 skin cells at a much faster rate than your epidermis 0:01:41.720 --> 0:01:45.679 and your dermist, which meant that your basil layer was 0:01:45.760 --> 0:01:51.480 growing up against your epidermis and your dermists squishing together. Yeah. 0:01:51.680 --> 0:01:53.480 And so when this would happen, when it would grow 0:01:53.560 --> 0:01:57.840 up against say you're your epidermis, it would create a 0:01:57.840 --> 0:02:00.800 point of contact, and that point of content act would 0:02:00.840 --> 0:02:03.240 create enough pressure so that your basil layer would buckle 0:02:03.320 --> 0:02:06.880 a little bit. And what's weird about that was that 0:02:06.960 --> 0:02:10.320 your little basil layer buckled in what appeared to be 0:02:10.480 --> 0:02:17.000 little patterns, little worlds, little swoops, little circles. But what's neat, 0:02:17.080 --> 0:02:20.440 chuck is at this point, within the next six weeks 0:02:20.560 --> 0:02:24.320 after it started, you had fingerprints that are going to 0:02:24.360 --> 0:02:27.640 stay the same for the rest of your life, just 0:02:27.760 --> 0:02:32.680 beneath your epidermis. Yeah, the tiny little chuck fingers are 0:02:32.720 --> 0:02:36.400 now sort of tiny little man fingers, but they are 0:02:36.400 --> 0:02:40.080 the same fingerprints throughout my entire line. That's right, And 0:02:40.120 --> 0:02:43.960 you can it's true damage your fingerprints. Some people have purposely, 0:02:44.000 --> 0:02:46.560 which we'll talk about, but for the most part, since 0:02:46.560 --> 0:02:50.040 it's your basil layer, that's where the actual fingerprint is. 0:02:51.480 --> 0:02:55.200 Even if you cut your epidermis, which happens, your skin 0:02:55.280 --> 0:02:58.000 will grow back in your basil layer will remain the same. 0:02:58.440 --> 0:03:00.880 Your fingerprints will remain the same. That's a great way 0:03:00.919 --> 0:03:04.880 to end this good night. Uh that was a great 0:03:04.880 --> 0:03:08.320 little story. And I would grow up to be a 0:03:08.360 --> 0:03:13.799 sociopath podcaster with those very same fingerprints. I don't think 0:03:13.880 --> 0:03:18.040 you're sociopathic. I'm just kidding. Um, So we're talking fingerprints, 0:03:18.240 --> 0:03:22.320 and you mentioned the little ridges, little worlds, and we're 0:03:22.320 --> 0:03:24.679 not making these words up. W H O R L 0:03:24.880 --> 0:03:28.680 S is actually what it's called worlds. Valleys and uh 0:03:28.800 --> 0:03:32.760 loops loops, arches, arches. Those are three. I don't know 0:03:32.760 --> 0:03:36.440 where you got valleys. Um, well, it's a in the pattern. 0:03:36.480 --> 0:03:39.640 But that's not a part of the official fingerprints fingerprint 0:03:39.640 --> 0:03:41.520 classic cases. No, no no, no, no, that's not a part 0:03:41.520 --> 0:03:45.840 of the classic Um, but each are unique. And we 0:03:45.880 --> 0:03:48.240 all know this because you know that's why they use 0:03:48.320 --> 0:03:52.880 fingerprinting as one of the biometric UH sciences to classify 0:03:52.960 --> 0:03:56.280 people and identify people. Um, there's a one in sixty 0:03:56.280 --> 0:03:59.520 four billion chance that your finger fingerprint will match exactly 0:03:59.560 --> 0:04:03.400 with someone. So get this. Sir Francis Galton was the 0:04:03.440 --> 0:04:07.600 one who said that, and he was saying that through 0:04:07.720 --> 0:04:11.360 his classification system legally speaking, as far as what would 0:04:11.360 --> 0:04:14.520 be admissible in court, probably there would be a one 0:04:14.520 --> 0:04:17.800 and sixty four chance of matching people's fingerprints up. He 0:04:17.880 --> 0:04:23.560 also he also thought that if you went down on 0:04:23.839 --> 0:04:27.440 more of a a more granular level and looked at 0:04:27.440 --> 0:04:31.360 people's fingerprints, there were probably a better chance that people 0:04:31.400 --> 0:04:35.880 would have fingerprints who matched. And if you take Galton's 0:04:36.279 --> 0:04:40.919 kind of liberal view of matching fingerprints, and you have 0:04:40.960 --> 0:04:43.720 a one and sixty four billion chance of having matching 0:04:43.720 --> 0:04:46.840 fingerprints with somebody just looking like that's somebody just looking 0:04:46.880 --> 0:04:53.159 at the patterns. Um. Since about a hundred billion people 0:04:53.200 --> 0:04:56.360 have lived in the history of humanity, that means that 0:04:56.480 --> 0:04:59.080 there's at least one pair of people who have ever 0:04:59.120 --> 0:05:03.400 lived who had the same fingerprints. And that's if you 0:05:04.320 --> 0:05:08.760 subscribe to his numbers. Yeah from eighteen whatever, which may 0:05:08.760 --> 0:05:11.760 be overestimating it are we are fingerprints may be slightly 0:05:11.800 --> 0:05:15.440 more similar than you think. Interesting. Yeah, well they are 0:05:15.560 --> 0:05:17.880 more unique than DNA, because we all know if you 0:05:17.920 --> 0:05:20.200 listen to the Twins podcast that twins can share a 0:05:20.200 --> 0:05:23.960 lot of DNA, but they can't share fingerprints. No, it's different, 0:05:24.240 --> 0:05:28.520 it's very different. Um, all right, so let's get into this. Fingerprints, 0:05:28.640 --> 0:05:32.880 um are actually made of ridges called friction ridges, and 0:05:33.040 --> 0:05:35.480 they have little pores underneath them, and it's the pores 0:05:35.520 --> 0:05:38.360 where you leak like sweat and oils, and that's actually 0:05:38.400 --> 0:05:41.680 what the mark you are leaving as a fingerprint is 0:05:41.720 --> 0:05:45.159 coming up through those pores at those friction ridges. You're 0:05:45.160 --> 0:05:47.960 not leaving skin behind, No, you're just leaving a little 0:05:47.960 --> 0:05:52.200 bit of steam, that's right. And they're really popular way 0:05:52.240 --> 0:05:56.920 of uh, probably the most popular biometric right now because 0:05:58.000 --> 0:06:02.160 everyone's leaving fingerprints. Everyone's got fingers, well not everyone. They're 0:06:02.160 --> 0:06:05.200 easy to classify, they're easy to sort. Um. They do 0:06:05.279 --> 0:06:07.320 mention this article that like you could probably do the 0:06:07.360 --> 0:06:10.600 same thing with like toe prints, but um, no one 0:06:10.640 --> 0:06:13.040 wants to ask all these criminals to take off their 0:06:13.040 --> 0:06:15.280 shoes and socks and like toe prints, especially not if 0:06:15.320 --> 0:06:18.279 they just defecated in the back seat of the police cruiser. Plus, 0:06:18.279 --> 0:06:20.119 you're more likely and they even mentioned this in the article, 0:06:20.200 --> 0:06:22.360 you're more likely to leave a fingerprint than a toe print. 0:06:22.800 --> 0:06:24.919 They don't even put that in here. A lot of 0:06:24.920 --> 0:06:28.080 people that was the most obvious. Uh yeah, you know, 0:06:28.520 --> 0:06:31.920 you're not gonna commit a crime barefoot, and some people do. 0:06:32.000 --> 0:06:37.440 But it's necessary. But nowadays it's virtually too late because 0:06:37.680 --> 0:06:42.000 we've amassed such a database of fingerprints that, like a 0:06:42.839 --> 0:06:45.520 bare footprint would be almost useless unless you had the 0:06:45.560 --> 0:06:47.599 person in the suspect. It was about one and every 0:06:47.640 --> 0:06:51.760 six people have their fingerprints on record. Yeah, and that 0:06:51.800 --> 0:06:53.800 doesn't mean that one and every six people have been 0:06:53.920 --> 0:06:56.839 charged with the crime. But there's a lot of ways 0:06:56.920 --> 0:07:02.480 that fingerprints make it into the fingerprint database. Aphis uh yeah, 0:07:02.480 --> 0:07:05.640 what people use them as a signature verifications these days, 0:07:06.200 --> 0:07:10.920 as um to identify victims, um job applications. Sometimes the 0:07:11.040 --> 0:07:13.960 first time mine made it in because my dad took 0:07:13.960 --> 0:07:16.840 me to the public library to have me fingerprinted as 0:07:16.840 --> 0:07:20.400 a child. Really yeah, it's just so now that like 0:07:20.440 --> 0:07:22.000 we have your kid on file in case he ever 0:07:22.080 --> 0:07:25.680 goes missing. Yep. After that whole Adam Walsh thing. That 0:07:25.800 --> 0:07:28.200 was it, like anything anybody said like this could help 0:07:28.200 --> 0:07:31.080 if your kid is kidnapped or whatever. Parents just did 0:07:31.080 --> 0:07:33.720 it in the early eighties. My parents did. No. No, 0:07:33.840 --> 0:07:36.720 I don't think I'm on file anywhere. Really with my fingerprints? 0:07:36.720 --> 0:07:40.600 That's good, is it? I guess so? Sure? Man, your 0:07:40.640 --> 0:07:44.360 fingerprints are your own? Yeah? Maybe so. Um, and that 0:07:44.520 --> 0:07:48.320 is one in six people. And apparently the iPhone five 0:07:48.640 --> 0:07:51.160 s the rumor is is it is going to have 0:07:51.240 --> 0:07:56.680 fingerprint authentification instead of your pass code. Wow, it's pretty neat. 0:07:56.960 --> 0:07:59.120 We'll see. That's the rumor. We used to have laptops 0:07:59.120 --> 0:08:00.960 here that had that. Well, yeah you did. I'd never 0:08:01.040 --> 0:08:03.160 use mine. Yeah I did. I thought it was pretty cool. Yeah. 0:08:03.200 --> 0:08:06.680 Thumb print right, Uh, whatever you wanted. I think it 0:08:06.800 --> 0:08:09.960 was really either your thumb, your fore finger, or your 0:08:10.240 --> 0:08:13.240 middle finger. I would have done my bigtoe right. It 0:08:13.280 --> 0:08:18.600 would have been like, isn't it obvious? Um, there's I 0:08:18.600 --> 0:08:24.960 guess cars. Some cars now have birometric Um. I guess ignitions. Yeah, 0:08:25.000 --> 0:08:27.520 and we might as well talk about why that stinks. Yeah, 0:08:27.560 --> 0:08:30.640 because in Malaysia. Yeah, in Malaysia, they cut off a 0:08:30.640 --> 0:08:33.000 guy's finger to get into his Mercedes. And that is 0:08:33.320 --> 0:08:36.720 a worry for police as fingerprinting becomes more and more 0:08:36.840 --> 0:08:40.560 used as authentification, uh that people are gonna start cutting 0:08:40.559 --> 0:08:48.280 fingers off to do so did you say authentification, authentification, authentication, authentication? 0:08:48.320 --> 0:08:53.080 What do you add in another syllable? Oh? Boy? So, hey, 0:08:53.360 --> 0:08:57.960 don't get on me about words. Yeah I can't. Okay, Um, 0:08:58.040 --> 0:09:02.679 there's one that won't bring up what the deletrius deleterious. 0:09:03.520 --> 0:09:07.359 I just say it in my own way. No, deletrious 0:09:08.200 --> 0:09:11.600 this is not a word. It is. You're deleting it. 0:09:11.600 --> 0:09:15.559 It deletes things. It's negative, all right. So, um, and 0:09:15.679 --> 0:09:20.719 if you off this case. Uh so the biometric companies 0:09:20.840 --> 0:09:23.240 who said, well, we can't have our customers fingers being 0:09:23.240 --> 0:09:26.080 cut off, said well, now we'll just add a little 0:09:26.120 --> 0:09:28.640 something that the texts blood flow. So now our customers 0:09:28.679 --> 0:09:30.880 are just kidnapped rather than have their fingers cut off 0:09:31.000 --> 0:09:34.920 or the the kidnapper doesn't know this. And you you 0:09:34.960 --> 0:09:37.040 still have your car, but you're out of finger right. 0:09:37.080 --> 0:09:39.640 You should probably put like that kind of thing on 0:09:39.760 --> 0:09:42.520 ads on busses, yeah, or put it on your car like, 0:09:43.280 --> 0:09:45.959 oh yeah, car will not start. A finger is detached. Yeah, 0:09:45.960 --> 0:09:48.040 because think about that could be even worse if their finger. 0:09:48.080 --> 0:09:49.920 If the finger doesn't work, they're like, oh, maybe it's 0:09:49.920 --> 0:09:52.959 his other finger. Just keep cutting fingers off and you're like, no, 0:09:53.080 --> 0:09:57.679 it needs a pulse. Alright. So we talked about the 0:09:57.720 --> 0:10:01.480 friction ridges. Yeah, they're called f Just remember because they 0:10:01.880 --> 0:10:05.480 buck up buckle under the pressure. The friction up against 0:10:05.520 --> 0:10:09.320 the dermis that can take the pressure. Buckles. Um. But 0:10:09.360 --> 0:10:12.680 the forms a specific pattern and this is what you know. 0:10:12.720 --> 0:10:14.960 The arrangement shape and size and number of lines is 0:10:14.960 --> 0:10:17.920 what they're looking for when they're identifying and comparing these things. 0:10:18.520 --> 0:10:21.680 And there's three different patterns there can be. Uh, there's 0:10:21.720 --> 0:10:25.240 loops begins on one side, curves up and around and 0:10:25.320 --> 0:10:28.120 exits the other. Yeah, look at your fingers while we describe. 0:10:28.640 --> 0:10:31.600 There are radio loops and owner loops, um radial slope 0:10:31.600 --> 0:10:35.719 toward the thumb, owner towards the little finger, and intuitive 0:10:35.800 --> 0:10:39.160 to tell which way that the slope is going. Oh yeah, 0:10:39.600 --> 0:10:41.560 just yeah, because technically you could be like, well no, 0:10:41.600 --> 0:10:43.280 I think it's so much way to turn your head. 0:10:44.559 --> 0:10:49.200 The aforementioned whirls are circular or spiral in nature, and 0:10:49.400 --> 0:10:52.319 arches slope up and then down like, and they're described 0:10:52.360 --> 0:10:58.080 here as narrow mountains. Yeah, it just goes. I think 0:10:58.120 --> 0:11:01.920 that summed it up. So those are the identifying marks 0:11:01.920 --> 0:11:04.600 on your fingers, um that you can see the naked eye. 0:11:04.640 --> 0:11:07.640 And then if you're in law enforcement, they're gonna be 0:11:07.679 --> 0:11:10.880 also analyzing something called minutia, which you can't see with 0:11:10.920 --> 0:11:13.880 the naked eye. No. And these are basically like further 0:11:14.040 --> 0:11:17.120 characteristics of the loops and worlds and arches. So you 0:11:17.280 --> 0:11:20.840 might you might have a spur, which is another um 0:11:20.880 --> 0:11:24.600 like world that comes off of a larger whirl um. 0:11:24.760 --> 0:11:27.160 Or there's an abrupt end to a ridge, or there's 0:11:27.200 --> 0:11:31.520 bifurcation or islands. It's like a world within a world. Um. 0:11:31.559 --> 0:11:35.280 There's deltas, which are like ridges that form like y patterns, 0:11:35.360 --> 0:11:37.640 just a little stuff like that, and they all form 0:11:38.040 --> 0:11:42.880 this classification system that the cops rely on when they 0:11:42.920 --> 0:11:46.599 fingerprint you. And the the science, the forensic science of 0:11:46.679 --> 0:11:53.480 fingerprinting is called deactyloscopy. That's right, like pterodactyl um. And 0:11:54.080 --> 0:11:56.480 I guess there are probably some places still that do 0:11:56.559 --> 0:11:58.840 it the old fashioned way UM and don't have digital 0:11:58.840 --> 0:12:05.200 scanning finger methods. Montana hello, Montana, Um. They would do 0:12:05.240 --> 0:12:08.040 it like you've seen it on countless TV shows and movies. 0:12:08.440 --> 0:12:13.079 They would clean your hand off, dry it off with alcohol. Yeah, 0:12:13.120 --> 0:12:14.959 they want to get all the sea bulm off, get 0:12:14.960 --> 0:12:18.840 all the sum off, roll the fingertip um, and then 0:12:19.120 --> 0:12:20.960 I usually say left or right, but I imagine you 0:12:20.960 --> 0:12:24.120 could do either way to get the ink on the finger. 0:12:25.360 --> 0:12:27.880 Make sure it's fully covered. Then you roll onto the 0:12:27.920 --> 0:12:31.800 card from fingernail to fingernail, from one side to the other. 0:12:32.120 --> 0:12:34.400 That is called a rolled fingerprint. Yeah. You do this 0:12:34.480 --> 0:12:39.240 with all eight fingers and two thumbs and uh, then 0:12:39.280 --> 0:12:41.680 you've got your set of rolled prints. Then they take 0:12:41.720 --> 0:12:45.560 your hands and cover all your fingers with the ink 0:12:45.960 --> 0:12:47.840 and then just have you press it down flat at 0:12:47.880 --> 0:12:51.400 the bottom of this fingerprint card. And uh, those are 0:12:51.520 --> 0:12:53.880 that's a set of flat prints which are used apparently 0:12:53.960 --> 0:13:00.760 to um verify the uh um yeah, exactly to say 0:13:00.760 --> 0:13:04.440 they have two sets basically, yeah. Um. If you live 0:13:04.480 --> 0:13:07.920 in the modern world and you live in a large city, 0:13:08.240 --> 0:13:11.400 you're probably gonna have digital scanners doing the same thing. Um. 0:13:11.400 --> 0:13:15.080 It's an optical scanner that basically put your fingers on 0:13:15.160 --> 0:13:19.320 there and it through magic converts that into digital data 0:13:19.360 --> 0:13:22.600 patterns and then they have programs that map those points 0:13:22.640 --> 0:13:27.200 and basically it's sort of like you see in the movies. Yeah, 0:13:27.320 --> 0:13:30.440 and what's neat about the optical scanners. The picture that 0:13:30.520 --> 0:13:36.000 it makes is the inverse. Yeah, yeah, that makes sense, 0:13:36.360 --> 0:13:40.880 So you're uh to negative image, right. The the the 0:13:40.880 --> 0:13:43.520 the worlds and everything had more light bounce off of them, 0:13:43.520 --> 0:13:47.000 so they tend to be lighter. Um, whereas like the 0:13:47.080 --> 0:13:49.840 valleys and everything in between, the friction ridges are darker. 0:13:50.400 --> 0:13:51.679 And I'm gonna go out on a limb and say 0:13:51.679 --> 0:13:55.280 it's more accurate than rolled prints. I might be wrong, 0:13:55.920 --> 0:13:59.280 You're probably right from what I've read. Sure, Yeah, because 0:13:59.800 --> 0:14:04.560 you know when someone's like you ever seen First Blood? No? Yeah, 0:14:04.559 --> 0:14:09.640 you have stallone the Vampire Show? No, No, that's true Blood, 0:14:10.080 --> 0:14:13.000 first Blood. The Rambo first printure. Remember when he was 0:14:13.520 --> 0:14:16.280 being difficult when they were booking him and he wasn't 0:14:16.280 --> 0:14:18.560 doing the fingerprinting right right, They couldn't get good prints 0:14:18.760 --> 0:14:21.120 because Rambo wouldn't stand for it. No, he doesn't take 0:14:21.120 --> 0:14:24.840 any crap, all right. There's two types of prints visible 0:14:24.840 --> 0:14:27.560 prints that we talked of. Um, actually we didn't talk 0:14:27.560 --> 0:14:30.040 about him there there if you actually leave an intention 0:14:30.120 --> 0:14:33.640 in something, a visible print like dirt or clay or 0:14:33.640 --> 0:14:35.760 something blood or something like that. Blood would be a 0:14:35.760 --> 0:14:38.200 good example. It's visible. You can look and say there's 0:14:38.240 --> 0:14:41.920 a fingerprint exactly. There's also latent prints, which we leave 0:14:42.160 --> 0:14:44.800 everywhere all the time. Um. And those are the ones 0:14:44.840 --> 0:14:46.680 that are just made with the sea bum coming out 0:14:46.720 --> 0:14:50.320 of our fingers, the pores on our friction ridges, and 0:14:50.680 --> 0:14:55.400 those are typically not necessarily naked to the the human eye. 0:14:55.400 --> 0:14:58.240 Like if you look at like, yes, stainless steel, you'll 0:14:58.280 --> 0:15:01.760 probably see some pressure clear class maybe right, But those 0:15:01.760 --> 0:15:06.600 are technically latent prints. Um. They also can be um 0:15:06.960 --> 0:15:09.400 invisible to the naked eye, and so they have to 0:15:09.440 --> 0:15:13.640 be um dusted. Yeah, and they actually do dust with 0:15:13.680 --> 0:15:16.560 a little brush. UM. I looked up the dusting powder 0:15:16.640 --> 0:15:20.440 fingerprinting powder, and apparently most of it these days is proprietary, 0:15:20.560 --> 0:15:22.920 so like you don't know exactly what's in it, really, 0:15:22.960 --> 0:15:27.720 I just guess like carbon, who knows. Maybe I know 0:15:27.920 --> 0:15:31.520 you should formulate your own Josh's fingerprinting caller, you know, 0:15:32.240 --> 0:15:35.480 market it to some local harmfulks enforcement agencies. Yeah, I'll 0:15:35.480 --> 0:15:38.320 sell it like snake oil or something like Uncle Peppi's 0:15:38.360 --> 0:15:43.840 patented a one blue ribbon fingerprinting. Uh so they lift 0:15:43.880 --> 0:15:46.440 the prints, um, these latent prints, and those are the 0:15:46.640 --> 0:15:49.680 obviously the prints too that you see criminals and TV 0:15:49.760 --> 0:15:53.520 shows and movies always trying to wipe off with a hanky, right, 0:15:53.920 --> 0:15:57.000 very wisely, Yeah, I wonder if what the if that 0:15:57.080 --> 0:16:00.680 really works? You want to get into that, do you know? Yes, 0:16:00.840 --> 0:16:04.240 it should Okay, it should work from what I understand. 0:16:04.600 --> 0:16:07.800 I read this one paper that was basically like, we 0:16:07.840 --> 0:16:12.880 should not be using fingerprints in court any longer. That 0:16:13.480 --> 0:16:17.680 first of all, we have DNA now, and DNA is objective. 0:16:17.880 --> 0:16:20.080 It's like this protein sequence is the same as this 0:16:20.120 --> 0:16:24.480 protein sequence. Right with fingerprinting is subjective, even though there's 0:16:24.520 --> 0:16:29.440 an extensive classification system, it's I think that this print 0:16:29.720 --> 0:16:34.080 matches up to this print. There's not. It's not quantitative, 0:16:34.760 --> 0:16:38.240 or if it is, it's not enough quantitative enough. Also, 0:16:38.480 --> 0:16:43.080 there's so much faith placed by the public in fingerprint 0:16:43.080 --> 0:16:51.040 analysis that fingerprinting people who do this work frequently are 0:16:51.240 --> 0:16:54.640 matching stuff like they're they're taking a great role print 0:16:55.200 --> 0:16:58.040 and comparing it to like just the worst smudge print 0:16:58.080 --> 0:16:59.960 on the planet, where you know, you can be like, 0:17:00.320 --> 0:17:05.080 I don't get that because I'm not a dactyloscopist. But 0:17:05.320 --> 0:17:08.040 I'm sure that somebody who who is that could could 0:17:08.080 --> 0:17:10.440 figure this out. And supposedly that's a lot of faith 0:17:10.480 --> 0:17:13.240 that we're placing into people, and that now that DNA 0:17:13.320 --> 0:17:16.880 evidence is becoming more and more UM available and prevalent 0:17:16.880 --> 0:17:20.720 and widespread, it's starting to show like um fingerprinting is 0:17:20.760 --> 0:17:23.760 actually probably put a lot of innocent people behind bars, 0:17:24.160 --> 0:17:27.280 and we really shouldn't rely on it anymore because even 0:17:27.320 --> 0:17:31.200 even if you have a great print that you took 0:17:31.240 --> 0:17:35.600 a latent print, right yeah, and there are plenty like 0:17:35.640 --> 0:17:38.720 they're not shysters or frauds or crooks because even within 0:17:38.760 --> 0:17:41.679 their profession, a lot of them are like there's a 0:17:41.720 --> 0:17:46.400 lot of recklessness going on here. Um that you're never 0:17:46.480 --> 0:17:49.960 going to have a really great latent print. It's never 0:17:49.960 --> 0:17:52.840 gonna be good, and so you're working from a deficit 0:17:52.960 --> 0:17:56.200 every time, and you're also comparing it to a role print, 0:17:56.240 --> 0:17:59.560 and a roll print is also not the same as 0:17:59.600 --> 0:18:02.320 another rolled print made right after. Like you can take 0:18:02.359 --> 0:18:05.439 somebody's finger and roll it from fingernails, fingernail, pick it up, 0:18:05.560 --> 0:18:07.800 put it on the next little box, roll the same 0:18:07.840 --> 0:18:10.240 finger from fingernail, the fingernail and you're going to have 0:18:10.720 --> 0:18:13.480 basically two different prints. So that's in the olden days 0:18:13.520 --> 0:18:16.520 before they had the digital scanning though, right, But those 0:18:16.520 --> 0:18:18.720 are still a lot of the ones on file imagine. Yes, 0:18:18.800 --> 0:18:22.840 And I feel like we're probably still dealing with the 0:18:22.880 --> 0:18:24.879 same deficits. The paper I read was from like two 0:18:24.920 --> 0:18:27.720 thousand five or seven, so it's not like it was 0:18:27.800 --> 0:18:30.040 old and they're they're saying like this is still going 0:18:30.080 --> 0:18:33.160 on with the advent of digital scanning. Plus, I think 0:18:33.359 --> 0:18:34.919 you know as well as I do, when you're a 0:18:34.960 --> 0:18:37.199 court and the attorney yells at the top of his 0:18:37.280 --> 0:18:40.439 lungs his fingerprints were found all over the murder scene, 0:18:40.520 --> 0:18:42.720 your your toast, well, yeah, and I think that a 0:18:42.760 --> 0:18:46.520 lot of perpetrators to think that, like if they have 0:18:46.560 --> 0:18:48.639 your prints but you're dead, that's it, and like they 0:18:48.680 --> 0:18:51.000 have you dead to rights, so you might as well confess. 0:18:51.080 --> 0:18:53.600 And I'm sure it's a great tool for confessing. Yeah. 0:18:53.600 --> 0:18:55.919 I wonder if d n A thwarts I wonder if 0:18:55.960 --> 0:18:59.600 anything like that actually thwarts people from committing crimes. You know, 0:19:00.000 --> 0:19:01.880 I wonder if anyone ever stops and goes, boy, now 0:19:01.880 --> 0:19:03.840 a d n A. I would think you can just 0:19:03.880 --> 0:19:06.119 wipe down a crime scene, Like if I drop a 0:19:06.160 --> 0:19:09.000 hair on the carpet, then I could be, you know, nabbed. 0:19:09.080 --> 0:19:11.600 Sure I would think that's a pretty good deterrent. Yeah, 0:19:11.720 --> 0:19:13.440 I just don't know in the criminal mind how how 0:19:13.480 --> 0:19:16.080 that operates. I'm sure it makes them operate a lot 0:19:16.280 --> 0:19:18.600 less sloppy than I used to. You know, that's a 0:19:18.600 --> 0:19:21.760 good point. All right, Let's talk a little bit about 0:19:21.760 --> 0:19:24.879 the history, because it's pretty interesting. I think, um that 0:19:25.000 --> 0:19:29.520 in ancient Babylon they actually uh press fingertips and clay 0:19:29.560 --> 0:19:33.520 to for some business transactions. Pretty advanced. I mean, thousands 0:19:33.520 --> 0:19:36.760 of years ago people already understood like if fingertips are unique, 0:19:36.840 --> 0:19:39.440 and of course the Chinese we're always ahead of the 0:19:39.480 --> 0:19:42.920 game on everything. It seemed like they actually used ink 0:19:43.040 --> 0:19:46.920 on paper for business transactions and help identify their kids, 0:19:47.200 --> 0:19:49.480 like my dad. Yeah, I thought it was kind of weird, though, 0:19:49.800 --> 0:19:52.960 can you un identify your child? Oh well, if they 0:19:53.119 --> 0:19:56.040 grow up, if they're kidnapped and take into another village, 0:19:56.280 --> 0:19:58.960 I guess, so they grow up in return to claim 0:19:58.960 --> 0:20:03.600 of birthright. Yeah, that's a good point. Sure. Um, it 0:20:03.720 --> 0:20:07.639 wasn't until they didn't use them for identifying criminals until 0:20:07.640 --> 0:20:10.960 the nineteenth century and there's a series of events that's 0:20:10.960 --> 0:20:14.240 sort of just not necessarily connected, happened one after the 0:20:14.240 --> 0:20:16.960 other to sort of advance it at the same time. 0:20:17.720 --> 0:20:21.320 The first eight was a guy named Sir William Herschel, 0:20:21.359 --> 0:20:26.560 and Englishman who was chief magistrate of the Hoogli District 0:20:26.960 --> 0:20:32.399 in India, and he started recording fingerprints when signing documents. 0:20:32.440 --> 0:20:34.960 So that's kind of the first thing, right. Then you 0:20:35.000 --> 0:20:38.720 mentioned Henry Faulds. He came around next, Scottish doctor. Yeah, 0:20:38.800 --> 0:20:41.320 he was, Um, I guess he got into Japanese pottery 0:20:41.320 --> 0:20:44.880 and noticed like the fingerprints left behind by the artists, 0:20:45.600 --> 0:20:49.320 and um, he started getting into fingerprinting. So he wanted 0:20:49.359 --> 0:20:52.160 to create a classification system and said, I'm not gonna 0:20:52.200 --> 0:20:54.720 do it myself. I'm cousins to Charles Darwin all this 0:20:54.800 --> 0:20:56.359 asked him to do it. He's pretty good at that, 0:20:56.680 --> 0:20:59.480 and Darwin said, I'm kind of busy, but I have 0:20:59.520 --> 0:21:02.320 another cousin. His name is Sir Francis Galton, and he's 0:21:02.359 --> 0:21:05.879 going to be into this. Galton here's a eugenicist. I 0:21:05.880 --> 0:21:10.600 wonder if Darwin was like, oh god, it's you know, 0:21:11.080 --> 0:21:15.960 another classification Henry again, I almos pass him off. The cousin, 0:21:16.680 --> 0:21:20.200 cousin Frank, Yeah, be cousin Frank. So, like you said, 0:21:20.240 --> 0:21:23.080 he was augenicist, um and he got I feel like 0:21:23.080 --> 0:21:26.480 we talked about him before he pops up here there, 0:21:26.760 --> 0:21:30.760 just pretty big in um in this era. Yeah, he 0:21:30.840 --> 0:21:33.280 was the first dude to really start kind of collecting 0:21:34.200 --> 0:21:37.920 biometric information on people, um, not just fingerprints, all kinds 0:21:37.920 --> 0:21:41.000 of stuff. And being a eugenicist, he decided that there 0:21:41.080 --> 0:21:45.840 was a perfect human and we should selectively breed ourselves. 0:21:45.920 --> 0:21:49.879 That's right. Yeah, we're not promoting his work by the way. Um, 0:21:49.920 --> 0:21:53.159 although in two he wrote a book called Fingerprints and 0:21:53.240 --> 0:21:55.840 he outlined his systems, first time it had ever been done, 0:21:56.600 --> 0:21:58.960 and it was based on the system we know today 0:21:59.119 --> 0:22:03.159 archist loops and roles. Uh. And then in France, the 0:22:03.200 --> 0:22:07.720 guy named Alfonse Bertillon. Now he's made maybe four appearances 0:22:07.760 --> 0:22:11.560 in our podcast before I knew I knew that name. Um, 0:22:11.640 --> 0:22:15.160 he was at the same time using his own system 0:22:15.200 --> 0:22:20.639 called bert Bertiel nage and uh, anthropometry is basically what 0:22:20.680 --> 0:22:22.959 he was doing. Yeah, because remember he was like working 0:22:22.960 --> 0:22:26.000 in the Paris police department and like he saw the 0:22:26.040 --> 0:22:28.439 same criminals come and go, but they use aliases. So 0:22:28.520 --> 0:22:32.040 he devised the system of like measuring their face and 0:22:32.119 --> 0:22:34.639 head in their tears and all that. Definitely sketches. He 0:22:34.680 --> 0:22:37.280 was definitely that one. Yeah, definitely UM. And he one 0:22:37.320 --> 0:22:40.760 of them also was fingerprinting too, but his his system 0:22:40.880 --> 0:22:43.639 was extremely exhaustive, even though it was adopted by the 0:22:43.760 --> 0:22:46.080 London police. I believe it was just all it was 0:22:46.200 --> 0:22:51.600 really time consuming, sure, but he was advancing the art, 0:22:51.960 --> 0:22:55.080 like eight of them at once. Uh. And then about 0:22:55.080 --> 0:22:57.760 the same time in Argentina, UM, a police officer named 0:22:57.800 --> 0:23:01.760 Juan Uh. You wanna try that a it sounds good, 0:23:01.840 --> 0:23:08.919 doesn't sound Argentinian, but Umo, he actually used fingerprinting. This 0:23:08.960 --> 0:23:12.880 is a two in a case to convict a mother 0:23:12.960 --> 0:23:15.080 who had killed her two kids, when in fact she 0:23:15.160 --> 0:23:18.840 was saying it was her her boyfriend. He actually matched 0:23:18.840 --> 0:23:21.760 fingerprints and she confessed and like he had her first 0:23:21.760 --> 0:23:24.680 case right, there were actually being used in uh to 0:23:24.800 --> 0:23:26.600 convict a criminal. Yeah, that was the first time it 0:23:26.720 --> 0:23:32.080 ever happened. Two and Buenos Aires, UM, I think what 0:23:32.240 --> 0:23:36.720 The following year eree a guy named Sir Edward Henry. 0:23:36.760 --> 0:23:39.399