| 1000 BC | Fingerprints are used | All throughout history, fingerprints were used on official documents. They were used like a signature in places like ancient Babylon, China, Nova Scotia, and Persia. |
| 1686 | Fingerprint patterns are noticed | A professor at the University of Bologna, in Italy, named Macello Malpighi noticed that fingerprints had common patters. Loops, whorls, arches, and ridges seemed to make up most fingerprints. |
| 1823 | Nine patterns documented | A different professor named Johannes Evengelista Purkinje documented nine specific patterns to help identify types of fingerprints. Even with his discovery, the use of fingerprints did not catch on quite yet. |
| 1858 | No two are the same | A magistrate in India named William Herschel began using fingerprinting as a way to make natives "sign" a contract. After several contracts, he began noticing that no two fingerprints were the same; and fingerprints could be used for identification purposes. |
| 1880 | Fingerprints are used to identify someone | A doctor in Tokyo became very interested in fingerprinting. Dr. Henry Faulds used fingerprints to identify who had left a stray bottle lying around—he matched fingerprints left on the bottle with a laboratory worker. |
| 1892 | Fingerprints used to solve a crime | Using a bloody fingerprint left on a doorframe, police in Argentina were able to identify a murderer. During the same year, certain police groups started keeping fingerprint files. |
| 1896 | Fingerprints around the world | The use of fingerprints was slow to catch on from country to country. After Argentina, British India took up the practice. |
| 1901 | England jumps on board | After the success in Argentina and India, Scotland Yard began questioning whether it would be a useful system for England. The Scotland Yard Fingerprint Bureau was founded. |
| 1902 | Success in Paris | Paris police began keeping fingerprints of criminals on file. After a murder was committed, police found a fingerprint at the scene and compared it against their files; they were able to identify the killer. |
| 1903 | America begins using fingerprints | The New York Police Department, and others across the state, began using fingerprints as a way to identify people. Over the next few years, the practice slowly spread westward. |
| 1905 | American military branches | Over time, the Army, Navy, and Marines began using fingerprinting. The National Bureau of Criminal Investigation also began keeping track of the fingerprints on file. |
| 1924 | Fingerprints move to FBI territory | The Federal Bureau of Investigation took over the cataloguing of fingerprints in America. By 1971 they had over 200 million fingerprints on file. |
| 1990 | Computerized fingerprinting | With the advancement in technology, programs began using Automated Fingerprint Identification Systems. The AFIS's scanned and stored fingerprints electronically. |
| 1996 | Fingerprinting children | Law enforcement groups saw the need to fingerprint children as a means of identifying kids who became lost, or went missing. Christ Migliaro founded Fingerprint America for this purpose. |
| 1999 | FBI moves to electronic fingerprinting | Through a long process, the FBI began transferring their fingerprint file to an electronic system. Millions of criminal fingerprints are now stored across the globe. |
