L 270/14 Official Journal of the European Union 15.10.2009 (Acts adopted under the EC Treaty/Euratom Treaty whose publication is not obligatory) DECISIONS COMMISSION COMMISSION DECISION of 9 October 2009 laying down specifications for the resolution and use of fingerprints for biometric identification and verification in the Visa Information System (notified under document C(2009) 7435) (Only the Bulgarian, Czech, Dutch, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Maltese, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish and Swedish texts are authentic) (2009/756/EC) THE COMMISSION OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES, Having regard to the Treaty establishing the European Community, Having regard to Regulation (EC) No 767/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 9 July 2008 concerning the Visa Information System (VIS) and the exchange of data between Member States on short-stay visas (VIS Regulation) ('), and in particular Article 45(2) thereof, Whereas: (") ) Council Decision 2004/512/EC of 8 June 2004 estab- lishing the Visa Information System (VIS) (%) established the VIS as a system for the exchange of visa data between Member States and gave a mandate to the Commission to develop the VIS. Regulation (EC) No 767/2008 defines the purpose and the functionalities of, and the responsibilities for the VIS and establishes the conditions and procedures for the exchange of visa data between Member States to facilitate the examination of visa applications and related decisions. L 218, 13.8.2008, p. 60. L 213, 15.6.2004, p. 5. G) (6) Commission Decision 2006/648/EC of 22 September 2006 laying down the technical specifications on the standards for biometric features related to the devel- opment of the Visa Information System (*) states that further specifications will be developed at a later stage. It is now necessary to lay down specifications for the resolution and use of fingerprints for biometric identifi- cation and verification in the VIS so that Member States can begin to prepare for the use of biometrics. It is extremely important that biometric data are of a high quality and are reliable. It is therefore necessary to define the technical standards that will make it possible to satisfy the requirements of quality and reliability. Verifications using four fingers have a much lower false rejection rate and failure to acquire rate compared to single finger verifications. The Central Visa Information System (CS-VIS) should therefore be able to perform biometric verifications for accessing data with four fingers flat. This decision does not create any new standards; it is coherent with ICAO standards. () O] L 267, 27.9.2006, p. 41.