I suspect that false imprisonment/recognition cases are lessened with biometrics, not increased. I absolutely believe you can point me to individual cases though.

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8fingerlouie 18 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Your DNA and fingerprints are literally everywhere you go, and they don't decay as soon as you leave. Hell, even passing close by a person can transfer your DNA to their clothes.

If the cops have a DNA Database, they "just" need to collect all DNA from a crime scene to compile a list of suspects, and by doing so, they're flipping the question of guilt around, you're no longer innocent until proven guilty, but guilty until proven innocent. You now have to prove you didn't "do it".

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leonidasrup 8 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

All the biometrics technologies are not perfect, e.g. there is a small chance of false positive, be it fingerprints, DNA, hair analysis, etc.

Veritasium had a nice video about this biometrics errors:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mvcesPWvUIc

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xboxnolifes 20 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

How could random prints be falsely linked to me if my prints are not in a database? It can only happen if they are.

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whimsicalism 20 hours ago | parent [-]

You can be falsely linked to a crime without biometric evidence and excluded on the basis of biometric evidence

	▲	crote 13 hours ago \| parent [-]
		That can also be trivially done without a biometrics database: just collect and compare when they become a suspect!