The Romanian Police suffered a major computer systems failure on June 20, leaving them without the software used to identify fingerprints and faces because of technical problems. Suspects had to be identified manually, without the support of information stored on databases, which play a vital role in modern police work. The Interior Minister said the systems hadn't been maintained properly.

Apparently the two programs had a fault in the power supply that could not be remedied. The Imagetrak program is the most complex database used by the Romanian Police and contains particulars of all registered suspects nationally including height, weight, eye color, hair and signs, such as tattoos, scars.

The Interior Minister, Mircea Dusa said contracts for the maintenance of computer systems had expired, but that money has already been allocated money for these services and negotiations for new contracts will begin September 14.

The automatic fingerprint identification - AFIS 2000 - was implemented in 1996 and was an important step in modernizing the Romanian Police Force . The system can quickly match fingerprints found to those stored on a database, performing in minutes what would take hours or even days to do manually.

Ioana Toader, ioana.toader@romania-insider.com

picture source: sxc.hu