NIST Special Publication 800-76

Draft

Biometric Data Specification for

Personal Identity Verification

January 24, 2005

U.S. Department of Commerce

Donald L. Evans, Secretary

Technology Administration

Phillip J. Bond, Under Secretary for Technology

National Institute of Standards and Technology

HratchG. Semerjian, Acting Director

I N F O R M A T I O N S E C U R I T Y

U.S. Department of Commerce

Donald L. Evans, Secretary

Technology Administration

Phillip J. Bond, Under Secretary for Technology

National Institute of Standards and Technology

HratchG. Semerjian, Acting Director

Charles Wilson

Patrick Grother

Ramaswamy Chandramouli

Information Technology Laboratory

National Institute of Standards and Technology

Gaithersburg, MD, 20899-8930
Special Publication 800-76 Biometric Data Specification for Personal Identity Verification

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NOTE FOR REVIEWERS

1. NIST has created this Special Publication 800-76 (SP 800-76) in response to the

comments received on the FIPS 201 public draft. The SP 800-76 provides the biometric

data requirements to support interoperability among government agencies. Details

regarding the acquisition and formatting of biometric data are moved from the FIPS 201

to this document.

2. Please submit your SP 800-76 comments using the comment template form provided on

the http://www.csrc.nist.gov/piv-project/fips201-support-docs.html website. Please

include the submitter's name and organization in the header section of the spreadsheet.

This will greatly facilitate processing of comments by NIST.

3. Comments should be submitted to DraftFips201@nist.gov. It is requested that Federal

organizations submit one consolidated/coordinated set of comments. Also, include

“Comments on Public Draft SP 800-76” in the subject line.

4. The comment period closes at 5:00 EST (US and Canada) on February 7th, 2005.

Comments received after the comment period closes will be handled on as-time-isavailable basis.
Special Publication 800-76 Biometric Data Specification for Personal Identity Verification

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REPORTS ON COMPUTER SYSTEMS TECHNOLOGY

The Information Technology Laboratory (ITL) at the National Institute of Standards and

Technology (NIST) promotes the U.S. economy and public welfare by providing technical

leadership for the Nation’s measurement and standards infrastructure. ITL develops tests, test

methods, reference data, proof of concept implementations, and technical analyses to advance

the development and productive use of information technology. ITL’s responsibilities include

the development of management, administrative, technical, and physical standards and

guidelines for the cost-effective security and privacy of non-national security-related information

in Federal information systems. This special publication 800-series reports on ITL’s research,

guidelines, and outreach efforts in information system security, and its collaborative activities

with industry, government, and academic organizations.

National Institute of Standards and Technology Special Publication 800-76, 21 pages

(January 24, 2005)
Special Publication 800-76 Biometric Data Specification for Personal Identity Verification

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Acknowledgements

The authors, Charles Wilson, Patrick Grother, and Ramaswamy Chandramouli of the National

Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), wish to thank their colleagues who reviewed

drafts of this document and contributed to its development. The authors also gratefully

acknowledge and appreciate the many contributions from the public and private sectors whose

thoughtful and constructive comments improved the quality and usefulness of this publication.
Special Publication 800-76 Biometric Data Specification for Personal Identity Verification

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Executive Summary

The Homeland Security Presidential Directive HSPD-12 called for new standards to be adopted

governing the interoperable use of identity credentials to allow physical and logical access to

Federal government locations and systems. The Personal Identity Verification (PIV) for Federal

Employees and Contractors, Federal Information Processing Standard (FIPS 201) was developed

to establish standards for identity credentials. This document, Special Publication 800-76 (SP

800-76), specifies technical acquisition and formatting requirements for the biometric credentials

of the PIV system and is a companion document to FIPS 201. It enumerates required procedures

and formats for fingerprints and facial images by restricting values and practices included

generically in published biometric standards. The primary design objective behind these

particular specifications is universal interoperability. Specifically, SP 800-76 involves the

preparation of biometric data suitable for transmission to the Federal Bureau of Investigation

(FBI) for background checks. It also provides requirements for formatting of the biometric data

on the PIV Card

1

.

1 A physical artifact (e.g., identity card, “smart” card) issued to an individual that contains stored identity credentials (e.g.,

photograph, cryptographic keys, biometric data) so that the claimed identity of the cardholder can be verified against the

stored credentials by another person (human readable and verifiable) or an automated process (computer readable and

verifiable).
Special Publication 800-76 Biometric Data Specification for Personal Identity Verification

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1. Introduction ............................................................................................................ 7

1.1 Authority.......................................................................................................... 7

1.2 Purpose and Scope......................................................................................... 7

1.3 Audience and Assumptions............................................................................. 7

1.4 Structure of Document .................................................................................... 8

2. Terms, Acronyms, and Notation........................................................................... 9

2.1 Terms.............................................................................................................. 9

2.2 Acronyms ........................................................................................................ 9

3. Fingerprint Specifications................................................................................... 10

3.1 Fingerprint Image Acquisition and Format..................................................... 10

3.1.1 Acquisition .......................................................................................... 10

3.1.2 Format................................................................................................ 11

3.2 Fingerprint Image Specifications for Background Checks............................. 13

3.3 Fingerprint Image Specifications for On-card Storage .................................. 14

4. Facial Image Specifications ................................................................................ 16

4.1 Acquisition and Format ................................................................................. 16

5. Common Header for PIV Biometric Data — CBEFF Structure ......................... 19

6. Biometric Device Requirements ......................................................................... 20

7. Bibliography ......................................................................................................... 21


  

Table 1: Fingers Imaged .............................................................................................. 10

Table 2: Dimensions of Imaging Platen........................................................................ 10

Table 3: General Record Header ................................................................................. 11

Table 4: Steps and Image Quality Assessment............................................................ 12

Table 5: Record Types for Background Checks........................................................... 13

Table 6: Extended Fields of the Type-14 Record ......................................................... 13

Table 7: PIV Card Compression Options ..................................................................... 14

Table 8: INCITS 385-2004 and PIV Requirements for Formatting of Facial Images .... 16

Table 9: Compression Ratios and Data Sizes for Facial Images ................................. 18

Table 10: Simple CBEFF Structure .............................................................................. 19

Table 11: PIV Compliant Patron Format A Fields......................................................... 19
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1. Introduction

1.1 Authority

This document has been developed by the National Institute of Standards and Technology

(NIST) in furtherance of its statutory responsibilities under the Federal Information Security

Management Act (FISMA) of 2002, Public Law 107-347.

NIST is responsible for developing standards and guidelines, including minimum requirements,

for providing adequate information security for all agency operations and assets, but such

standards and guidelines shall not apply to national security systems. This recommendation is

consistent with the requirements of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Circular A130, Section 8b(3), Securing Agency Information Systems, as analyzed in A-130, Appendix IV:

Analysis of Key Sections. Supplemental information is provided A-130, Appendix III.

This recommendation has been prepared for use by federal agencies. It may be used by nongovernmental organizations on a voluntary basis and is not subject to copyright. Nothing in this

document should be taken to contradict standards and guidelines made mandatory and binding

on Federal agencies by the Secretary of Commerce under statutory authority. Nor should this

recommendation be interpreted as altering or superseding the existing authorities of the Secretary

of Commerce, Director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), or any other Federal

official.

1.2 Purpose and Scope

FIPS 201 [FIPS], Personal Identity Verification (PIV) for Federal Employees and Contractors,

defines procedures for the PIV lifecycle activities including identity proofing, registration, PIV

Card issuance, and PIV Card usage. FIPS also defines the structure of an identity credential

which includes biometric data. This document contains technical specifications for biometric

data mandated in FIPS. These specifications reflect the design goals of interoperability and

performance. The goals are addressed by citing biometric standards normatively and by

enumerating requirements where the standards include options and branches. In such cases, a

biometric profile can be used to elucidate required versus optional content. This document goes

further by constraining implementers' interpretation of the standards. Such restrictions are

designed to ease implementation, facilitate interoperability, and ensure performance, in a manner

tailored for PIV applications.

In the general case, it is implicit that a specification of a data format constitutes an injunction on

an implementer to acquire and prepare the data in certain ways. Thus, this document

supplements the state (data format) with some process (data acquisition) requirements.

1.3 Audience and Assumptions

This document is targeted at Federal agencies and implementers of PIV systems. Readers are

assumed to have a working knowledge of biometric standards and applications.
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1.4 Structure of Document

This document is organized as follows:

 Section 1 (this section) explains the authority, purpose and scope, audience and

assumptions of the document, and outlines its structure.

 Section 2 defines terms and acronyms used in this document.

 Section 3 gives specifications for fingerprints used in PIV processes.

 Section 4 specifies facial image requirements for PIV.

 Section 5 defines the format of the common header used in all PIV biometric data

representation.

 Section 6 specifies requirements on biometric devices.

 Section 7 is the bibliography.
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2. Terms, Acronyms, and Notation

2.1 Terms

Term Definition

Platen Imaging surface of a fingerprint reader. It is a touch pad upon which fingers are placed.

Segmentation For fingerprints, segmentation is the separation of an N finger image into N single finger

images.

2.2 Acronyms

Acronym Definition

ANSI American National Standards Institute

BIOAPI Biometric Application Programming Interface

CBEFF Common Biometric Exchange Formats Framework

FIPS Federal Information Processing Standard

EFTS / F Electronic Fingerprint Transmission Specification (Appendix F)

INCITS InterNational Committee for Information Technology Standards

ISO International Organization for Standardization

IEC International Electrotechnical Commission

NFIQ NIST Fingerprint Image Quality

PIV Personal Identity Verification
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3. Fingerprint Specifications

This section specifies acquisition and formatting requirements of fingerprint images. Section 3.1

provides requirements for a full set of fingerprint images. Section 3.2 provides format

requirements for image transmission to FBI. Section 3.3 provides compression and cropping

requirements for on-card storage.

3.1 Fingerprint Image Acquisition and Format

This section specifies requirements for electronic capture of full set of fingerprint images. It

describes the mode of collection as well as the detailed format of the record header for storing

the image data.

3.1.1 Acquisition

A subject's fingerprints shall be collected by taking three multi-finger plain impression images

(also called a slaps or flats), as enumerated in Table 1. The multi-finger images shall be

obtained by simultaneously placing multiple fingers on an imaging platen without any rolling

movement. Ordinarily, all ten fingerprints shall be imaged in this process; however, if one or

more fingers is not available (for instance, because of amputation) then as many fingers as are

available shall be imaged.

Table 1: Fingers Imaged

Mode of Collection

1 Combined impression of the four fingers on the right hand (except for the thumb)

2 Combined impression of the four fingers on the left hand (except for the thumb)

3 Combined impression of the left and right thumbs.

Devices used for capture of these fingerprints shall have been certified as being compliant with

the Appendix F requirements of the FBI’s Electronic Fingerprint Transmission Specification

(EFTS/F). This ensures conformance to the Image Acquisition Settings Level 31 of [FINGSTD].

The native scanning resolution of the device shall be 197 pixels per centimeter (500 pixels per

inch). The imaging devices used to capture these images shall have the imaging dimensions

specified in Table 2.

Table 2: Dimensions of Imaging Platen

Size Maximum

Width (mm)

Maximum

Height (mm)

Minimum

Width (mm)

Minimum

Height (mm)

Dimensions for Four-Finger Platens 83.3 76.2 76.2 50.8

Dimensions for Two-Thumb Platens 83.3 76.2 50.8 50.8

A set of rolled images may be collected, in addition to the plain impressions. Such a set shall

include the three multi-finger plain impressions listed in Table 1, with the option that the two

thumbs may be included separately.
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3.1.2 Format

Fingerprint images retained shall be formatted according to the INCITS 381-2004 finger image

based interchange format standard [FINGSTD]. Single-finger images shall be obtained by

segmentation of the three multi-finger images. The single finger images shall be formatted in

one [FINGSTD] record. The record may also include the associated multi-finger plain

impressions. The record shall be wrapped in the CBEFF structure described in Section 5.

Table 3 gives clause-by-clause specialization of the [FINGSTD]. The primary purpose of the

Table is to specify PIV requirements for those fields of [FINGSTD] that have optional content.

Rows 2-11 give normative content. Row 12 mandates the CBEFF header. Rows 13-28 give PIV

requirements for the fields of the General Record Header of Table 2 of [FINGSTD]. These are

common to all images in the record. Similarly, Rows 29-39 provide requirements for the Finger

Image Header Record in Table 4 of [FINGSTD]. Column 5 provides PIV specific requirements

or parameter defaults of the standard.

Table 3: General Record Header

1. Clause title and/or field name INCITS 381-2004 PIV

Field or

Content

Value

Required

Values Allowed

Informative Remarks

2. Byte and bit ordering (5.1) NC A Big Endian MSB then LSB

3. Scan sequence (5.2) NC A

4. Image acquisition reqs. (6) NC Level 31 Table 1

5. Pixel Aspect Ratio (6.1) NC A 1:1

6. Pixel Depth (6.2) NC A Level 31  8

7. Grayscale data (6.3) NC A Level 31  1 byte per pixel

8. Dynamic Range (6.4) NC A Level 31  200 gray levels

9. Scan resolution (6.5) NC A Level 31  500 ppi

10. Image resolution (6.6) NC 500 ppi - no

interpolation

11. Fingerprint image location (6.7) NC A Slap placement info, centering

12. CBEFF Header (7) MF MV Patron Format A

see Section 5.

Multi-field CBEFF Header

13. General Record Header (7.1) NC A

14. Format Identifier (7.1.1) MF MV A 0x46495200 (‘F’ ‘I’ ‘R’ 0x0)

15. Version Number (7.1.2) MF MV 010 0x30313000 (‘0’ ’1’ ’0’ 0x0) Ver.1 Rev.0

16. Record Length (7.1.3) MF MV MIT size excluding CBEFF structure

17. CBEFF Product Identifier (7.1.4) MF MV A CBEFF pid from IBIA

18. Capture Device ID (7.1.5) MF MV A vendor specified

19. Image Acquisition Level (7.1.6) MF MV 31 Settings Level 31

20. Number of Images (7.1.7) MF MV 10 or 13 Denote by K, see line 29. See notes 1, 2, 3.

21. Scale units (7.1.8) MF MV 0x01 0x02 inches or centimeters

22. Scan resolution (horz) (7.1.9) MF MV 500 197

23. Scan resolution (vert) (7.1.10) MF MV 500 197

24. Image resolution (horz) (7.1.11) MF MV 500 197

25. Image resolution (vert) (7.1.12) MF MV 500 197

26. Pixel Depth (7.1.13) MF MV 8 Grayscale with 256 levels

27. Image compression alg. (7.1.14) MF MV 2 WSQ. See note 4

28.

Finger image record format Reserved (7.1.15) MF MV A four bytes

29. K fingerprints, or multi-finger prints, or palms

30. Finger data block length (7.2.1) MF MV MIT

31. Finger position (7.2.2) MF MV MIT

32. Count of views (7.2.3) MF MV ≥ 1 M views of this finger. See note 5.

33. M views of this finger, or multi-finger print, or palm

34. View number (7.2.4) MF MV MIT

35. Finger/palm image quality (7.2.5) MF MV 1, 2, or 3 NFIQ. See notes 6, 7, 8 and 9

36. Impression type (7.2.6) MF MV 0, 1, 2 or 3 See ANSI NIST ITL 1-2000

37. Horizontal line length (7.2.7) MF MV 368

38.

Finger record header Vertical line length (7.2.8) MF MV 368

See note 10

39. Finger image data (7.2.9) MF MV MIT Compressed WSQ Data
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Acronym Meaning

MF mandatory field [FINGSTD] mandates a field shall be present in the record

MV mandatory value [FINGSTD] mandates a meaningful value for this field

NC normative content [FINGSTD] gives normative practice here. Such clauses do not define a field in the FIR.

A as required by standard For PIV, value or practice is as specified in [FINGSTD]

MIT mandatory at instantiation-time For PIV, mandatory value shall be determined at the time the record is instantiated

NORMATIVE NOTES:

1. If certain fingers cannot be imaged, the value of this field shall be decremented accordingly.

2. The left and right four-finger images, and two-thumb, images may also be included. The value of this field

shall be incremented accordingly.

3. This field will be 10 for just the fingers, and 13 if the slap impressions are included.

4. Compression of images whose image resolution is 500 ppi shall be implemented using a certified version of

the Wavelet Scalar Quantization (WSQ) algorithm.

5. The term view refers to the number of images of that particular finger. This value will exceed one if

imaging have been repeated. Inclusion of all images of a finger can afford some benefit in a matching

process. Retention of all images with quality values 1-4 is recommended. The first such image should

have quality 1-3 per the following notes.

6. Quality values shall be specified. The quality values shall be those produced by the NIST Fingerprint

Image Quality (NFIQ) method discussed in [NFIQ]. Such values are intended to be predictive of the

relative performance of a minutia based fingerprint matching system. A lower quality value indicates a

superior fingerprint image.

7. The NFIQ values shall be computed at the time of acquisition, ideally before the images are compressed for

storage. The sequence of steps involved in using NFIQ values for real-time quality assessment of the

acquired image is provided in Table 4.

Table 4: Steps and Image Quality Assessment

Step Action

1 Attending official should inspect fingers and require absence of foreign material where

possible.

2 Acquire fingerprints.

3 Perform any needed segmentation of multi-finger images into single-finger images

4 Compute NFIQ value for each single-finger image

5 If four or more images have NFIQ value less than or equal to 3 then go to step 8

6 Otherwise repeat steps 2-5 up to three times

7 If after three acquisitions no four fingers have NFIQ values of 1-3 then go to step 8 anyway

8 Write the final record.

8. Images of quality 4 and 5 shall only be present if reacquisition of the fingerprints from the live subject

failed to improve quality.

9. The NFIQ value shall be set to 254 (the [FINGSTD] code for undefined) if this record is not a single finger

print (i.e. it is a multi-finger image, or a palm print).

10. The values are minimum image sizes.
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3.2 Fingerprint Image Specifications for Background Checks

PIV fingerprint images transmitted to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) as part of the

background checking process shall be formatted according to the ANSI/NIST-ITL 1-2000

standard [FFSMT] and the CJIS-RS-0010 [EFTS] specification. The images shall each be

contained in Type 4 or Type 14 records as described in Table 5. These records shall be prepared

using the data obtained in Section 3.1. Thus, this section specifies only formatting requirements;

it does not include sensor or acquisition related specifications beyond those in Section 3.1.

Table 5: Record Types for Background Checks

Data Format in [FFSMT] Availability Reference

1 Fourteen Type 4 records Now Section 3.1.1.4 "Federal Applicant

User Fee" of [EFTS]

2 Three Type 14 records. This is an extension to

the FBI format allowing submission of

unsegmented slap impressions.

From March

2005

N-FACS Report [NFACS]

In Option 2, fields 14.001 through 14.013 and 14.999 of the ANSI/NIST Type 14 record are

required. In addition:

1. For single-finger Type 14 records, the 14.021 field shall be included. It shall contain

NFIQ values [NFIQ]. This is a mandatory requirement for all slap (flat) fingerprint

submissions to the FBI, starting in March 2005. The format, given in Table 6,

supplements Table 16 in [FFSMT].

2. For multi-finger Type 14 records, the 14.022 field shall be included. It shall contain the

coordinates of the left, right, top, and bottom corner pixels of the four constituent fingers,

or the two constituent thumbs. The format, given in Table 6, supplements Table 16 in

[FFSMT].

Table 6: Extended Fields of the Type-14 Record

Field Size Per

Occurrence

Occurrences

Identifier

Condition

Field Number

Field Name

Char. Type

Min

Max

Min

Max

Max. Size in Bytes

Example Data

SEG M

M

M

M

M

M

14.021 SEGMENT POSITION

FINGER NUMBER

LEFT

RIGHT

TOP

BOTTOM

N

N

N

N

N

1

1

1

1

1

2

4

4

4

4

2

1

1

1

1

1

4

1

1

1

1

1

9

9

14.021:10<US>3<US>352<US>725<US>1265<

RS>

9<US>375<US>750<US>175<US>765<RS>

8<US>800<US>1150<US>5<US>581<RS>

7<US>1200<US>1598<US>274<US>801<GS>

IQM M

M

M

14.022 IMAGE QUALITY

METRIC

FINGER NUMBER

QUALITY SCORE

N

N

1

1

2

2

2

1

1

4

1

1

5

8

14.022:10<US>5<RS>9<US>4<RS>8<US>3<R

S>7<US>3<GS>
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NORMATIVE NOTES:

1. IQM stands for Image Quality Metric. This mandatory ASCII field shall contain the image quality scores

for the individual fingers. Each finger score is defined by the FINGER NUMBER and the QUALITY SCORE

separated by the <US> separator. Individual finger quality definitions are separated by the <RS> separator.

2. The field identifier SEG indicates Finger Segment Positions. This mandatory ASCII field shall contain

offsets to the locations of image segments containing the individual fingers within the image. The offsets

are relative to the origin, (0,0), which is in the upper left corner of the image. The horizontal offsets (X) are

the pixel counts to the right, and the vertical offsets (Y) are the pixel counts down. A finger segment is

defined by the FINGER NUMBER, the X coordinates (LEFT, RIGHT) and the Y coordinates (TOP, BOTTOM), of its

bounding box. The five information items within a finger segment definition are separated by the <US>

separator. Individual finger segment definitions are separated by the <RS> separator.

INFORMATIVE NOTES:

1. The codes <GS>, <RS>, and <US> are delimiters used here to represent non-printing ASCII characters.

2. The NFIQ values in 14.022, for example "9<US>4<RS>" means that finger 9 has quality 4.

3.3 Fingerprint Image Specifications for On-card Storage

Fingerprint images stored on the PIV Card shall be formatted according to the INCITS 381-2004

finger image standard [FINGSTD]. The images of the primary and secondary fingers shall be

stored in two separate [FINGSTD] records. Each record data shall be wrapped in a CBEFF

structure as defined in Section 5. These images may be two of those obtained from the full set of

fingerprints specified in Section 3.1. Alternatively, the two images may be obtained exclusively

for on-card storage in accordance with requirements outlined in Section 3.1. Due to the lack of

storage on the PIV Card, two additional compression and cropping schemes are permitted for

fingerprint images, as defined in Table 7.

Table 7: PIV Card Compression Options

Default

The default is to be applied in cases where there no resource constraints

Pixels

Both

dimensions

Centimeters

Both

dimensions

Inches

Both

dimensions

Compression

Ratio

Compressed Data Size

(bytes)

368 – 425 1.62 – 2.16 0.64 – 0.85 15:1 9029 – 12042

Permitted Minimum Image Dimensions and Data Sizes

Options 1 and 2 shall only be applied if space constraints require it.

Option 1

Crop the image about the grayscale center of mass. Optionally invoke a minutiae detector to

direct the cropping. Crop to no fewer than 368 pixels in both dimensions. Apply WSQ at

whatever minimum compression ratio that will satisfy the storage requirements, but not to

exceed 20:1.

Pixels

Both

dimensions

Centimeters

Both

dimensions

Inches

Both

dimensions

Compression

Ratio

Compressed Data Size

(bytes)

368 1.85 0.73 15:1 to 20:1 6772

Option 2

Crop the image about the grayscale center of mass. Optionally invoke a minutiae detector to

direct the cropping. Crop to no fewer than 320 pixels in both dimensions. Apply WSQ at
Special Publication 800-76 Biometric Data Specification for Personal Identity Verification

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compression of 15:1.

Pixels

Both

dimensions

Centimeters

Both

dimensions

Inches

Both

dimensions

Compression

Ratio

Compressed Data Size

(bytes)

320 1.62 0.64 15:1 6823
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4. Facial Image Specifications

This section details normative requirements for PIV implementations where facial images are

collected and retained electronically.

4.1 Acquisition and Format

This section specifies requirements for the collection and retention of facial images. Facial

images shall be collected and formatted such that they conform to all normative clauses of

INCITS 385-2004 [FACESTD]. The images shall be embedded within the CBEFF structure

defined in Section 5. Because [FACESTD] is generic across applications it includes clauses that

have either-or requirements. Column 6 of Table 8 gives normative practice or value

specifications for PIV.

While the table is not fully conformant with the Implementation Conformance Statement [ICS]

standard, the addition of a "values supported column" as specified in Section 9.1 of [ICS] should

be used by implementers for checking conformance to the requirements.

Table 8: INCITS 385-2004 and PIV Requirements for Formatting of Facial Images

1. Clause title and/or field name INCITS 385-2004 PIV

Field or

Conten

t

Value

Reqd

Values

Allowed

Informative Remarks

2. Byte Ordering (5.2.1) NC A Big Endian

3. Numeric Values (5.2.2) NC A Unsigned Ints

4. CBEFF CBEFF Header (5.3) MF MV Patron format

A of sec. 5.

Multi-field CBEFF Header

5. Format Identifier (5.4.1) MF MV A

6. Version Number (5.4.2) MF MV A

hex values indicating INCITS 385-2004

records

7. Record Length (5.4.3) MF MV MIT size of FIR not including CBEFF

structure it's embedded in

8.

Facial

Header

Number of Facial Images (5.4.4) MF MV ≥ 1 one or more images (K ≥ 1). See line 21.

9. Face Image Block Length (5.5.1) MF MV MIT

10. Number of Feature Points (5.5.2) MF MV ≥ 0 positive, if features computed

11. Gender (5.5.3) MF OV OIT

12. Eye color (5.5.4) MF OV OIT

13. Hair color (5.5.5) MF OV OIT

14. Feature Mask (5.5.6) MF OV OIT

these fields populated with meaningful

values at agency discretion, otherwise 0

for unspecified.

15. Expression (5.5.7) MF OV 1 Neutral

16. Pose Angles (5.5.8) MF OV 0 Unspecified = Frontal

17.

Facial Info. Single

instance of subjectspecific info.

Pose Angle Uncertainty (5.5.9) MF OV 0 Attended operation so should be frontal.

18. MPEG4 Features (5.6.1) NC OIT

19. Center of Facial Features (5.6.2) NC OIT

20. FeaturesThe Facial Feature Block Encoding OF OV OIT

21. K instances

22. Facial Image Type (5.7.1) MF MV 1 See note 1.

23. Image Data Type (5.7.2) MF MV 0 or 1 See note 4. Compression alg.

24. Width (5.7.3) MF MV MIT

25. Height (5.7.4) MF MV MIT

See note 2.

26. Image Color Space (5.7.5) MF MV 1 sRGB. See Note 3.

27. Source Type (5.7.6) MF MV 2 or 6 digital still or digital video

28. Device Type (vendor supplied

device ID) (5.7.7)

MF MV MIT

29.

Image Info. Each

instance has imagespecific info.

Quality (5.7.8) MF MV A std requires 0 (i.e. unspecified)

30. Image Data Data Structure (5.8.1) MF MV MIT Compressed Data

31.

Basic

In

he

rit

Inheritance (6.1) NC A
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1. Clause title and/or field name INCITS 385-2004 PIV

Field or

Conten

t

Value

Reqd

Values

Allowed

Informative Remarks

32. Image Data Encoding (6.2) NC A + Note 4.

33. Image Data Compression (6.3) NC A + Note 4.

34. Facial Header (6.4.1) NC A include 4 fields

35. Facial Information (6.4.2) NC A include 2 fields

36. FormatImage Information (6.4.3) NC A include 8 fields

37. Inheritance (7.1) NC A Inherits Basic

38. Purpose (7.2.1) NC A frontal Annex A

39. Pose (7.2.2) NC Frontal +/- 5 degrees

40. Expression (7.2.3) NC Neutral

41. Assistance in positioning face

(7.2.4)

NC A Only the subject appears

42. Shoulders (7.2.5) NC A Body + Face toward camera

43. Backgrounds (7.2.6) NC Uniform

Annex A.4.3

Recommend 18% Gray per Annex A.4.4

44. Subject and scene lighting (7.2.7) NC A Uniform

45. Shadows over the face (7.2.8) NC A None

46. Eye socket shadows (7.2.9) NC A None

47. Hot spots (7.2.10) NC A Should be absent. Diffuse light.

48. Eye glasses (7.2.11) NC A Subject's normal condition

49.

Scene

Eye patches (7.2.12) NC A Medical only

50. Exposure (7.3.2) NC A No saturation

51. Focus and Depth of Field (7.3.3) NC A In focus

52. Unnatural Color (7.3.4) NC A White balance

53. Color or grayscale enhancement

(7.3.5)

NC A + no

recompress.

No post-processing

54. PhotographicRadial Distortion of the camera

lens (7.3.6)

NC A + Follow

Annex A.8

55. aspect ratio (7.4.2.1) A 1:1 pixels

56.

Geometry

origin (7.4.2.2) A top left is 0,0

57. Density (7.4.3.1) NC A 7 bits dynamic range in gray

58. Color Sat (7.4.3.2) NC A 7 bits dynamic once in grayscale

59.

Color

Profile

Color space (7.4.3.3) NC 24 bit RGB Option a, reported in color space field

above. See Note 3

60.

Frontal (clause 7)

Digital

Video Interlacing (7.4.4) NC A

61. Inheritance (8.1) NC A Inherits Frontal + Basic

62. Scene (8.2) NC A Inherits Frontal + Basic

63. Centered Image (8.3.2) NC A Nose on vertical centerline

64. Position of Eyes (8.3.3) NC A Above horizontal centerline

65. Width of Head (8.3.4) NC A

66.

Photo

graph

ic

Length of Head (8.3.5) NC A

67. Digit

al

Resolution (8.4.1) NC CC ≥ 240

See note 2

68. Inheritance (8.5.1) NC A

69.

Full Frontal (clause 8)

Form

at Image Information (8.5.2) NC A

Acronym Meaning

FIR Face Information Record facial header + facial info + repetition of (image info + image data)

MF mandatory field [FACESTD] requires a field shall be present in the FIR

OF optional field [FACESTD] allows a field to be present in record

MV mandatory value [FACESTD] requires a meaningful value for a field

OV optional value [FACESTD] allows a meaningful value or allows 0 to be used to connote "unspecified"

NC normative content [FACESTD] gives normative practice here. Such clauses do not define a field in the FIR.

A as required For PIV, value or practice is as specified in [FACESTD]

MIT mandatory at instantiation-time For PIV, mandatory value that shall be determined at the time the record is instantiated

OIT optional at instantiation-time For PIV, optional header value that may be determined at the time the record is instantiated

NORMATIVE NOTES:

1. PIV facial images shall conform to the Full Frontal Image Type defined in Section 8 of [FACESTD].

2. Face recognition performance is a function of the spatial resolution of the image. [FACESTD] does not

specify a minimum resolution for the Full Frontal Image Type. For PIV, faces shall be acquired such that a
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20 centimeter target placed on, and normal to, a camera's optical axis at a range of 1.5 meters shall be

imaged with at least 240 pixels across it. This ensures that the width of the head (i.e. dimension CC in

Figure 8 of [FACESTD]) shall have sufficient resolution. This specification and clause 8.3.4 of

[FACESTD] implies that the image width shall exceed 420 pixels. This resolution specification shall be

attained optically without digital interpolation. The distance from the camera to the subject should be

greater than or equal to 1.5 meters (for distortion reasons discussed in Annex A.8).

3. The image data shall be converted to the sRGB color space for storage. As stated in clause 7.4.3.3 of

[FACESTD] this requires application of the color profile associated with the camera in use.

4. Image data shall be formatted in either of the compression formats enumerated in clause 6.2 of

[FACESTD]. Maximum compression ratios are specified in Table 9. Both whole-image and single-regionof-interest (ROI) compression are permitted. If ROI compression is used, the inner region shall be

rectangular with width greater than or equal to 4W/5 and height greater than or equal to W, with W being

the width of the image. The ROI shall be centered on the point located midway between the eyes and on

the vertical axis through the nose. Compression should not be applied during intermediate stages of

processing.

Table 9: Compression Ratios and Data Sizes for Facial Images

Property Whole-image compression ROI compression

Compression Ratio Inner Region  24:1

Compression Ratio Outer Region

 24:1

 120:1

Uncompressed Size for W = 420, H = 560 705600 705600

Compressed size minimum (bytes) 29400 19992

Table 9 sizes do not include the [FACESTD] header nor the CBEFF structure.

5. More than one image may be stored in the record. It may be appropriate to store several images if

appearance changes over time (beard, no beard, beard) and images are gathered at re-issuance. The most

recent image shall appear first and serve as the default provided to applications.
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5. Common Header for PIV Biometric Data — CBEFF Structure

PIV biometric data records specified in [FINGSTD] and [FACESTD] shall be embedded in a

data structure conforming to Common Biometric Exchange Formats Framework [CBEFF]. The

data shall be signed: The CBEFF signature block shall include a signature (for integrity) as

specified in Section 4.4.2 of [FIPS]. This overall arrangement is depicted in Table 10.

Table 10: Simple CBEFF Structure

CBEFF STRUCTURE

CBEFF_HEADER CBEFF_BIOMETRIC_RECORD CBEFF_SIGNATURE_BLOCK

Section 5 Sections 3,3.3 and 4 FIPS 201

All PIV biometric data, except that detailed in Section 3.2, shall be stored in CBEFF Structures

conforming to Patron Format A [CBEFF, Annex A]. That format specifies which CBEFF fields

shall be present by means of a bit mask. The value for that mask for PIV shall be 0x3E70. The

mask shall be included in the header. The required fields shall be in the order indicated in Table

11.

Table 11: PIV Compliant Patron Format A Fields

Patron Format A Field Length Patron Format

A Requirement

PIV

Requirement

Options

Mask

PIV Required

Value

BDB Format Owner 2 bytes M M

BDB Format Type 2 bytes M M

Security Options 1 byte M M 0x0D

Options Fields Present Mask 2 bytes O M 0x3E70

Biometric Creation Date 8 bytes O M 0x0010

Validity Period 16 bytes O M 0x0020

Biometric Type 3 bytes O M 0x0040

Patron Header Version 1 byte O M 0x0200

Biometric Purpose 1 byte O M 0x0400

Biometric Data Type 1 byte O M 0x0800

Biometric Data Quality 1 byte O M 0x1000

Creator 4+N O M 0x2000

INFORMATIVE NOTES:

1. 0x3E70 is the sum of the elements in column 5.

2. 0x0D is the bit pattern 00001101 meaning: options mask is present; data is signed but not encrypted; and

integrity protection is present.

3. PIV’s CBEFF Patron Format based on NISTIR 6529-A Patron Format A is a superset of the fields in

Patron Format C (BioAPI BIR).

4. Column 4, PIV Requirement, is mandatory by definition.

5. The values for the Format Owner and Format Type Code fields are given in the respective data format

standards [FACESTD] and [FINGSTD].
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6. Biometric Device Requirements

Devices used in the collection of biometric data for PIV shall be Biometric Service Providers

(BSP) conformant to the [BIOAPI] and [CBEFF] standards. BioAPI provides modularity to the

application developer. Devices shall produce data conformant to the CBEFF Patron Format C

specified in [CBEFF, Annex C]. Given the requirement for PIV data to be formatted in the

Patron Format A specification, all applications accessing a BSP shall be capable of transforming

Patron Format C data into the Patron Format A specification. A transforming application is

defined in Section 4.19 of [CBEFF].
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7. Bibliography

Citation

Code

Document

BIOAPI INCITS 358-2002, American National Standard for Information Technology - The

BioAPI Specification.

FIPS FIPS 201, Personal Identity Verification, National Institute of Standards and

Technology, 2005.

FINGSTD INCITS 381-2004, American National Standard for Information Technology - Finger

Image-Based Data Interchange Format

FACESTD INCITS 385-2004, American National Standard for Information Technology - Face

Recognition Format for Data Interchange

NISTIR 6529-A - Common Biometric Exchange Formats Framework (CBEFF), NIST

Interagency Report, April 2004.

CBEFF

NIST 6529A is expected to be approved as INCITS 398-2005, American National Standard

for Information Technology – Common Biometric Exchange Formats Framework (CBEFF)

(same content as NISTIR 6529-A). Expected approval date: February 2005.

FFSMT ANSI/NIST-ITL 1-2000 – Data Format for the Interchange of Fingerprint, Facial, &

Scar Mark & Tattoo (SMT) Information, ANSI, 2000.

EFTS CJIS-RS-0010 (V7) - Electronic Fingerprint Transmission Specification, Federal

Bureau of Investigation, Department of Justice, January 1999.

NFACS IAFIS-DOC-07054-1.0, CJIS, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Department of Justice,

April 2004.

NFIQ NISTIR 7151 - Fingerprint Image Quality, NIST Interagency Report, August 2004

ICS Methods for Testing and Specification (MTS); Implementation Conformance

Statement (ICS) proforma style guide. EG 201 058 V1.2.3 (1998-04)