PDP-15 Central Processing Unit
date: label: date made
content: 1972
name: label: maker
content: Digital Equipment Corporation
notes: label: Description
content: This object is part of the Finder prototype fingerprint reader, a minicomputer used by the FBI to match fingerprints after they had been through the preprocessor.
label: Description
content: From the late nineteenth century, fingerprints have been used by police agencies to identify both criminal suspects and bodies of the deceased. With the introduction of the FBI Finder system in 1972, fingerprints became electronic information that could be processed and communicated at electronic speeds. Hence this system symbolizes changes in the connections between electronic information technology and privacy, government power, and the limits of law enforcement.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
title: label: Title
content: PDP-15 Central Processing Unit, Part of the FINDER System
setName: label: See more items in
content: Medicine and Science: Computers
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: 1988.0467.01
label: catalog number
content: 1988.0467.01
label: accession number
content: 1988.0467
objectType: label: Object Name
content: Mainframe
physicalDescription: label: Measurements
content: overall: 72 in x 84 in x 30 in; 182.88 cm x 213.36 cm x 76.2 cm