Biometric Hashing System Aims to Save Trafficking Victims by Erasing Their Identities

A new biometric identification system from TrustStamp could make a real impact in the fight against human trafficking at the US-Mexico border. The system, which will be trialed by Attorneys General in Guanajuato and New Mexico, offers a workaround to the longstanding issue of information sharing between the states.

While police agencies on either side of the border might have valuable information to share concerning victims of human trafficking, the need to obtain warrants to share that information has presented a serious obstacle – in many cases to the detriment of the victims. TrustStamp’s solution is to establish biometric templates for such persons based on facial recognition, which can then be hashed to eliminate direct links between the biometrics and personally identifiable data. Authorities can then share this hashed biometric data freely, and if a match is found between the authorities concerning a person of interest, at that time the regular legal procedures pertaining to subpoenas and so on can be initiated.

What’s more, as Markets Insider reports, the families of trafficking victims can also upload photos to be hashed, further improving the chances that law enforcement can help to track down those individuals.

TrustStamp and its Attorneys General partners haven’t yet revealed the timeline for their Proof of Concept trial, but the company says it plans to extend its solution to more government authorities down the line. TrustStamp is also planning to provide Attorneys General offices with encrypted communication systems that can only be decrypted by authorized users after they are authenticated via facial recognition.

Source: Markets Insider

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August 31, 2018 – by Alex Perala