fingerprinting babies

malaysia makes it to the front page of bbc world news with this article. just looking at the title, I was like so what? they print babies here in the US too. but there is a difference. from the nst article,it sounds like the main purpose is to identify criminals. in the States, it is to prevent baby switching and kidnapping, not to identify criminals. even so, how reliable is this technology? with the ease of DNA matching, some states are starting to review the footprinting requirements.

Florida Department of Law Enforcement
'...An inked footprint could be useful in identifying an infant who was abducted shortly after birth and then quickly recovered. In most cases, the tiny feet of newborns are full of creases and wrinkles. As a baby grows, these creases and wrinkles will decrease and the details of the footprint ridges will become more prominent. Because of these changes, the footprints taken at birth might not be useful in identifying an older child...'

New York State Governor's Office
'...The Health Department eliminated a rule in March 1997 requiring all New York hospitals to footprint newborns and to fingerprint their moms. The footprints were often of such poor quality they were rarely used for identification. Furthermore, new identification technology, such as DNA matching, made footprinting and fingerprinting obsolete long ago. Eliminating the requirement saves hospitals $1.5 million a year...'

however, footprinting newborns is still widely done. but not to identify criminals. so implement it in malaysia? is baby switching and kidnapping prevalent in malaysia? or is just to identify criminals? if so, is there a huge discrepancy between the number or birth certificates vs. ID cards? whatever the outcome, bbc has deemed it worthy of their asia-pacific front page...