Metropolitan police goes live with mobile fingerprint scanners

Metropolitan police goes live with mobile fingerprint scanners

London's police service becomes the latest force to get hand-held devices under national roll out

The Metropolitan police has gone live with fingerprint scanning devices, which allow police to identify crime suspects on the streets.

The Met is the 25th force to introduce the mobile identification service (MobileID), meaning more than half the police forces in England and Wales are using the scanners since they were launched by the National Policing and Improvement Agency (NPIA) last year.

Police officers at the service will now be able to check an individual's identity on the beat within two minutes. MobileID allows police officers to scan a person's fingerprints and check them against information from the national fingerprint database, IDENT1, for verification. According to the NPIA, fingerprints taken on the devices are not retained after a search.

One of the aims of the technology is to cut the number of trips police make to the police station, so that officers can spend more time on the frontline.

Mark Rowley, assistant commissioner at the Met, said: "Evidence has shown that a full identification arrest can tie-up both the subject and the police officer for several hours. Even a traditional identity check conducted on the street can take an extended period of time to complete.

"It is effective particularly in revealing serious and violent offenders who will do everything they can to prevent the police from knowing their true identities."

The NPIA signed a contract with 3M Cogent in 2010 for mobile fingerprint identification devices. The deal followed field trials involving 28 police forces using Lantern devices to test how mobile fingerprinting performed in an operational environment.

The MobileID project forms part of the Information Systems Improvement Strategy (ISIS), a reform programme for the police service that is using IT to improve efficiency.

Earlier this month, West Midlands police announced plans to roll out 70 hand-held MobileID devices following a successful pilot of the technology.