Handling the “Voiceprint” Issue

What was and is “Voiceprint”/Aural-Spectrographic Identification? Throughout the years, going all the way back to the Second World War, speaker identification by spectrograms has had an influence on Forensic Speaker Identification. The method has been criticized and embraced by different people at different points in time. This paper describes the issues diachronically, using the most important references as a thread. Questions are asked to the phonetic science community concerning their beliefs and their actions regarding the critics of the method and what the method has for a kind of influence on today’s forensic voice identification. It seems as if a common view towards the early stages in the development of ”voiceprint” identification, is that not many phoneticians contributed with a view or opinion (Hollien, 1977). However, this paper presents several well-known scientists and their papers regarding the issue at an early stage and throughout the years. It also discusses the proponents’ arguments and credibility.