ELFT-EFS Evaluation 1

March 2011: ELFT-EFS Evaluation #1 Final Report Released.

ELFT-EFS Evaluation #1 Final Report (NISTIR 7775)        
NISTIR 7775 Appendix A       
NISTIR 7775 Appendix B       
NISTIR 7775 Appendix C

This report describes the design, process, results, and conclusions of ELFT-EFS Evaluation #1; an accuracy test of latent fingerprint searches using features marked by experienced human latent fingerprint examiners, in addition to automatic feature extraction and matching (AFEM).

January 2010: ELFT-EFS Evaluation 1 Preliminary Report Available Most, but not all of the data processing for ELFT-EFS Evaluation #1 has been completed and is reported in this document. Some of the data processing, most notably the multi-encounter galleries, will be completed and included in the final report. This document provides an opportunity to present the results available to date without awaiting additional processing and the final report. To see the report click here

July 2009: ELFT-EFS Evaluation 1 Announced The ELFT-EFS Evaluation 1 will commence 2 August 2009 and is limited to all ELFT-EFS Public Challenge participants that submitted results by the 28 June 2009 ELFT-EFS Public Challenge deadline. Anonymous participation in ELFT-EFS Evaluation 1 will not be permitted. ELFT_EFS Evaluation 1 will evaluate the accuracy of latent matching using features marked by experienced human latent fingerprint examiners. The purpose of this test is to evaluate the current state of the art in latent feature-based matching, by comparing the accuracy of searches using images alone with searches using different feature sets. The features sets will include the current IAFIS latent feature set, and different subsets of the Extended Feature Set (EFS) features proposed by CDEFFS . A key result of the test is to determine when human feature markup is effective. Because human markup is expensive in terms of time, effort, and expertise, there is a need to know when image-only searching is adequate, and when the additional effort of marking minutiae and extended features is appropriate.

April 2009: The ELFT-EFS Public Challenge Is Now Open The ELFT-EFS Public Challenge is a practice evaluation: an open-book test on public data to validate formats and protocols. The results are not for substantive analysis, and participants will remain anonymous in their results. The public challenge will be conducted from 15 April 2009 through 15 June 2009. The ELFT-EFS Public Challenge instructions and datasets will be finalized on 15 April.

February 2009: Announcing NIST Latent Fingerprint Workshop 2009 We are pleased to announce NIST Latent Fingerprint Workshop 2009, to be held on March 19 and 20 at NIST. This workshop will present and discuss the results of the recently completed NIST Evaluation of Latent Fingerprint Technologies (ELFT) Phase II -- which evaluated the performance of "lights-out" encoding and matching of latent images. This workshop will also provide a venue for the upcoming NIST Evaluation of Latent Fingerprint Technologies: Extended Feature Sets (ELFT-EFS).

November 2008: NIST Evaluation of Latent Fingerprint Technologies: Extended Feature Sets We are pleased to announce ELFT-EFS - the FBI-sponsored NIST Evaluation of Latent Fingerprint Technologies: Extended Feature Sets. The purpose of this evaluation is to determine the effectiveness of human latent examiner marked fingerprint features on latent fingerprint search accuracy, specifically with respect to the comparative accuracy of image-only searches, image+minutiae searches, and image+extended feature searches. The attachment outlines the evaluation, which begins with a public challenge problem and workshop, March 19-20, 2009.