U.S. Army to launch biometric intelligence lab

With less than a month before its July 29th launch, the U.S. Army is working towards setting up its Biometrically Enabled Intelligence System Integration Lab project, as well as recruiting companies to participate in the initiative, according to a report by Washington Technology.

As the U.S. Army continues to engage in ongoing combat against small terrorist groups that are harder to identify among the general population, its need for advanced biometric and forensic technology, including fingerprint, facial and iris recognition, has become more crucial than ever.

By establishing a biometrically enabled intelligence systems integration lab, DOD officials and other agencies will have greater access to biometric intelligence.

Additionally, the lab will help to ensure their biometric architectures adhere to the necessary technical and operational components, rather than simply depending on proprietary technology.

According to the tender agreement, the Communications Electronics Research and Development Engineering Center Intelligence and Information Warfare Directorate departments of the army are “conducting a market survey to identify potential sources for the research, development, and implementation of the software framework and infrastructure for the (software modules, interfaces, data repositories, etc.) necessary for establishing a Biometrically Enabled Intelligence System Integration Lab”.

Through the initiative, the departments are also researching and developing “the methods and standards of integration of aforementioned biometric technologies to establish baseline processing capabilities,” as well as implementing “ongoing research, development, test, and evaluation support leveraging the SILs capabilities.”

The U.S. Army intends on setting up the systems integration lab as a virtual lab that will store software modules, interfaces, and data repositories — all of which do not currently exist, according to the tender agreement.

The current biometric architecture comes from the Joint Urgent Operational Need Statements (JUONS). Those statements arrive at the Defense Department’s branches and agencies from the field and through poor communications channels.

With just a few weeks away from the launch, organizers of the initiative have made it mandatory that all participating companies and subcontractors must be fully staffed by July 29, and all responses to the sources sought notice should be delivered by July 14.

Article Topics

biometrics  |  Department of Defense  |  facial recognition  |  fingerprint recognition  |  iris recognition  |  U.S. Army