The German parliament has approved a law which states that fingerprints appear as a second biometric feature on new passports.

Friday was the day when the upper house of the German parliament approved a law according to which the ePassport will include a digital print of the owner’s index finger as well as a digitized photograph.

The law was approved in May by the lower chamber of the parliament. It becomes valid November 1.

The original draft included a section that provided for the automatic storage of fingerprints by local residents’ registration offices (passports can be obtained here as well). This section was removed.

Police will be able to access passport photographs online when registration offices are closed (there are an estimated 5,300 such offices), in circumstances when waiting would endanger the ongoing

investigation. According to the rules already adopted by the European Commission, citizens of the European Union will have their fingerprints included in on the newly issued passports by 2009.