Spectrographic voice identification: a forensic survey.

A survey of 2000 voice identification comparisons made by Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) examiners was used to determine the observed error rate of the spectrographic voice identification technique under actual forensic conditions. The qualifications of the examiners and the comparison procedures are set forth. The survey revealed that decisions were made in 34.8% of the comparisons with a 0.31% false identification error rate and a 0.53% false elimination error rate. These error rates are expected to represent the minimum error rates under actual forensic conditions.