True, these algorithms aren’t alone in their slightly shaky statistical foundations. Fingerprinting has no known error rate either,74 nor do bite mark analysis, blood spatter patterning75 or ballistics.76 In fact, according to a 2009 paper by the US National Academy of Sciences, none of the techniques of forensic science apart from DNA testing can ‘demonstrate a connection between evidence and a specific individual or source’.77 None the less, no one can deny that they have all proved to be incredibly valuable police tools – just as long as the evidence they generate isn’t relied on too
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