US Marshals Service set to buy SIC Biometrics fingerprint scanners

The U.S. Marshals Service (USMS), the agency of the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) that oversees the classified Witness Security Program, known as WITSEC, intends to award a five-year, firm-fixed-price blanket purchase agreement (BPA) worth potentially $1 million to SIC Biometrics Global, Inc. for its line of Wi-Fi Mobile fingerprint readers.

The devices to be purchased under the BPA are the Identifi-45 Wi-Fi FAP 45 Capture Device, the Identifi-50 Live Scan Wi-Fi FAP 50 Capture Device, and battery replacements for both devices. The estimated period of performance will be for one base year, with four one-year option periods, and the pricing that’s established at the time of the BPA award will be the pricing that’s utilized when establishing all orders, USMS said.

The contract will be awarded through USMS’s Information Technology Division (ITD). The Blanket Purchase Agreement will allow each USMS district to place orders for preapproved hardware.

ITD aids with USMS IT support, equipment, and services for all U.S Marshals Offices and the 94 USMS District offices and sub-offices in more than 400 geographical dispersed staffed sites throughout the US, Alaska, Guam, the commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, Mexico, Jamaica, Puerto Rico, Hawaii, and the Virgin Islands.

The two new SIC Biometric readers seamlessly integrate both Automated Biometric Identification System (ABIS) and Automated Fingerprint Identification Systems (AFIS) and enable capturing four-fingers, two-fingers flat, or single fingerprint rolls. The ldentiFi readers acts as a Wi-Fi router providing the user with the ability to capture U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) certified fingerprints regardless of the operating system that’s being used. The new IdentiFi series readers include iris related functions to display real-time streaming and the ability to capture high-resolution dual iris photos.

ABIS, also known as IDENT, is operated and maintained by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Office of Biometric Identity Management (OBIM), which is the lead designated provider of biometric identity services for DHS and maintains the largest biometric repository in the U.S. government. It currently holds approximately 300 million unique identities and processes more than 400,000 biometric transactions per day.

IDENT is the central DHS-wide system for storage and processing of biometric and associated biographic information for national security; law enforcement; immigration and border management; intelligence; background investigations for national security positions and certain positions of public trust; and associated testing, training, management reporting, planning and analysis, or other administrative uses.

Through biometric interoperability with the U.S. Department of Defense and DOJ, IDENT shares critical biometric information using advanced data filtering and privacy controls.

AFIS is a standardized biometric identification system that uses digital imaging technology to store, search, and analyze fingerprint and palmprint data that’s been established by all states and federal agencies. AFIS integrates with the FBI’s Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System (IAFIS), which contains the fingerprint records that have been sent to the FBI by the states and territories and federal law enforcement agencies. IAFIS provides automated fingerprint search capabilities, latent fingerprint searching capability, electronic image storage, and electronic exchange of fingerprints and responses 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. 

ITD is responsible for a mobile application which delivers access to information contained in law enforcement databases like AFIS with the return of near real-time investigative analysis information results, which enables on the spot decisions to clear or arrest subjects within seconds from inside a location without movement of the subject to a secured communications area. USMS said this “dramatically improv[es] mission success and officer safety.”

USMS explained that ITD needs a way to purchase the new SIC Biometric devices and maintenance on an as needed basis by individual districts because current USMS fingerprint readers use a proprietary mobile application that is the only mobile app that has been approved by ITD for use with the fingerprint readers on the USMS devices (phones, tablets, etc.), and only the SIC Biometrics ldentifi-50 and ldentifi-45 fingerprint readers are compatible with it.

“If another brand of fingerprint readers were to be purchased,” USMS explained, the software associated with those readers would have to be approved by ITD to operate on USMS devices before the alternate fingerprint readers could be utilized.” And “at this point in the life cycle of this product, with the principal purpose of this requirement being maintenance of the current application, there is no anticipated costs savings from competition. Competition would likely increase the cost to USMS as switching to a new vendor would cost hundreds of USMS labor hours to obtain ITD approval for new software.”

USMS said there “would also be costs associated with developing the new fingerprint readers to be compatible with the mobile application, in addition to replacing hundreds of the existing fingerprint readers in the field.”

USMS said other vendors were found under U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) multiple award schedules, GSA Advantage, and U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration Solutions for Enterprise-Wide Procurement, but “none of the fingerprint readers met the brand name requirement.”

Through the WITSEC program, USMS provides for the security, health, and safety of government witnesses and their immediate dependents whose lives are in danger because of their testimony against drug traffickers, terrorists, organized crime members, and other major criminals. WITSEC has protected, relocated, and given new identities to more than 19,000 witnesses and their family members since the program was established in 1971.

USMS also provides federal judicial security, prisoner transportation, and fugitive apprehension, including administration of the 5 Most Wanted Fugitive Program. It also runs the National Sex Offender Targeting Center and administers the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act under its Sex Offender Investigation Branch.

Article Topics

biometrics  |  Department of Justice  |  fingerprint readers  |  government purchasing  |  law enforcement  |  SIC Biometrics  |  U.S. Government