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NEC Corporation of America announced that it has been awarded a multiyear contract with the Western Identification Network, Inc. (WIN) to modernize WIN’s multistate criminal identification system. The updated system will include advanced identification capabilities (such as high-resolution palm and fingerprint matching and other emerging biometric functions), disaster recovery facilities, and enhanced system performance.
WIN is a nonprofit organization that provides reliable, effective, leading-edge identification services to the law enforcement agencies and citizens of its member states – Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, Utah, Washington, Wyoming, and California (as an interface member). Its members have access to approximately 28 million fingerprint records of the Western United States.
“WIN has served for nearly a quarter of a century as a cooperative law enforcement venture that helps apprehend criminals that could otherwise effectively disappear across state lines. We’re excited about the potential our future holds with NEC, and look forward to providing continued first-rate biometric identification services to our membership,” said Kenneth E. Bischoff, WIN CEO.
This contract will move the existing WIN system to a highly fault-tolerant architecture supporting the most advanced biometrics technology available today. Further, key elements of NEC’s cloud-based offerings, such as FBI Criminal Justice Information Services (CJIS) -compliant data centers, Network Operations Center, remote managed services, and server virtualization, are used to increase system security, reliability, and maintainability. Compliant with the FBI’s latest Electronic Biometric Transmission Specification, this contract will also position WIN to take advantage of identification services being implemented by the FBI’s Next Generation Identification (NGI) system.
“Use of WIN’S operating budget virtually eliminates the need for upfront capital investment,” said Raffie Beroukhim, Vice President of Biometric Solutions for NEC. “We believe this services-based model is a much more cost-effective way to help law enforcement organizations implement and maintain biometric identification systems, and ultimately keep criminals off the street.”
“This updated system will provide our members with a more accurate search engine that will save investigation time,” said Julie Butler, Records Bureau Manager at the Nevada Department of Public Safety and chairperson of the WIN Board of Directors. “And with NEC’s service-oriented architecture members can expand their identification services to include other biometric modalities such as facial recognition.”
Mr. Beroukhim added, “NEC is pleased to have earned the opportunity to continue its relationship with WIN and to provide a critical service to law enforcement agencies of the Western United States. Selection of NEC following a competitive procurement process that included benchmark and site visits, once again confirms NEC as the leading provider of IT‑centric, service-based ABIS solutions in North America.”
WIN’s enhanced system is slated to launch in fall 2013.