West Virginia’s I-79 Corridor has been called the “biometrics capital of the world” because it is home to several unique, world-class identity management assets, while being conveniently located to most of the United States and Canada. Numerous companies and non-profit organizations are located here and engaged in the biometrics/identity management sector. Their presence is transforming the north central region of the state.

About WVHTC Foundation Biometrics
Our biometrics group has extensive technical expertise in the field of biometrics, having provided subject matter expertise, technical leadership, and testing services to the Department of Defense (DoD), United States Army Biometrics Task Force (BTF), and Biometrics Fusion Center (BFC) for over five years.

WVHTC Foundation engineers have played key roles in a variety of biometrics initiatives for the DoD, including the US Army, Navy, Air Force, USSOCOM, National Security Agency (NSA), Marine Corps Office of Military Commissions, and other DoD entities.

The WVHTC Foundation is particularly active in adapting cutting-edge law enforcement biometric techniques and systems for DoD use. Foundation engineers studied the Chicago Police Department’s Citizen Law Enforcement Analysis and Reporting (CLEAR) system, and have led experiments within the DoD intended to determine whether the system could be adapted for use in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Significant Accomplishments:

• Our staff at the BFC worked with the Technical Support Working Group to utilize a commercial Face Recognition system, similar to one in operation at the Pinellas County (FL) Police Department, to analyze over 30,000 photos of enemy combatants for duplicate identities in Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom. WVHTC Foundation engineers also used this system to work with the DoD Office of Military Commissions, MITRE, and the FBI Audio Visual Image Analysis Unit to provide face recognition analysis to support prosecution of enemy combatants in Afghanistan.
• The Naval Post-Graduate School has relied on WVHTC Foundation engineers at the Biometrics Fusion Center to execute field tests of biometric systems as key contributors to the USSOCOM Tactical Network Topology (TNT) experiments. Foundation staff developed experiment objectives, measures of performance and measures of effectiveness, and procedures to evaluate various biometric vendor offerings for the last seven of these quarterly scenario events. Our engineers assessed the performance of the systems in realistic DoD exercises on land and at sea.
• Our technical team has assisted the US Navy in its effort to develop the requirements for the “Identity Dominance System – Maritime Domain (IDS-MD).” IDS-MD is being developed as the US Navy’s Program of Record for biometrics. WVHTC Foundation engineers developed and coordinated biometric system tests aboard the USS Mustin and USS Ingraham in Sea Trial experiments to assess how biometric systems could be used to identify potential adversaries during Maritime Interception Operations.
• The experiments above established a base of knowledge for the Navy to perform biometric identifications in very austere conditions that included submission of fingerprint queries to the DoD’s Automated Biometric Identification System (ABIS) and the FBI’s Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System (IAFIS). The Sea Trials were used as a Proof of Concept trial for the Navy’s nascent biometrics developmental program.
• WVHTC Foundation staff members Kimberly Woods and Thomas McLaughlin co-authored “Using Technology to Authenticate Individuals: A Case Study.”
• Our staff provided particularly relevant leadership in iris identification algorithm testing at the BFC. WVHTC Foundation technical experts used biometrics records from Operation Iraqi Freedom to organize iris images, fingerprints, and face photos into a multi-modal test database. The biometrics database includes over 200,000 iris images from over 50,000 individuals, allowing statistically significant testing of biometrics matching algorithms. The WVHTC Foundation staff then used the database to measure iris matching algorithm performance with using ANSI/INCITS 409.1 test standards. This project was executed in less than six months.
• WVHTC Foundation engineers also provide leadership in critical testing and evaluation of biometric identification systems for the DoD in Afghanistan and Iraq. These evaluations are a crucial step in the rapid deployment of biometric technologies in Iraq. Our staff performs a comprehensive battery of tests which include conformance to recognized data transmission standards (e.g., the FBI Electronic Fingerprint Transmission Specification), logging and reporting, backup and restore, encryption, and compatibility with required operating systems and databases.
• Engineers here also provide technical support to the DoD in the Center for Identification Technology and Research (CITeR), the National Science Foundation Industry University cooperative research group for biometrics. CITeR includes government participation from DOJ, DHS, DoD, NSA, CIA, FAA, and USSOCOM.
• WVHTC Foundation engineers also participate in the Intelligence Technology Innovation Center Colloquia on biometrics research. WVHTC staff members regularly attend biometrics workshops and presentations at the National Institute for Standards and Technology, and participate in INCITS standards development.

West Virginia’s I-79 Corridor has been called the “biometrics capital of the world” because it is home to several unique, world-class identity management assets, while being conveniently located to most of the United States and Canada. Numerous companies and non-profit organizations are located here and engaged in the biometrics/identity management sector. Their presence is transforming the north central region of the state.