Selflearning Speaker Identification

A voice is much more than just a string of words. Voices, unlike fingerprints, are inherently complex. They signal a great deal of information in addition to the intended message: the speakers' sex, for example, or their emotional state, or age. Although evidence from DNA analysis grabs the headlines, DNA can't talk. It can't be recorded planning, carrying-out or confessing to a crime. It can't be so apparently directly incriminating. Perhaps it is these features that contribute to the interest and importance of Forensic Speaker Identification (FSI)

Almut Braun carried out forensic phonetic speaker identification experiments (voice lineups) with 306 lay listeners. Blind listeners significantly outperformed sighted listeners when the speech recordings were presented in studio quality.

A voice is much more than just a string of words. Voices, unlike fingerprints, are inherently complex. Forensic Speaker Identification explains what FSI involves, and clarifies the problems of inferring identity from speech under the less than ideal conditions typical in forensics.