This paper describes a comparative study on fingerprint recognition systems - the project BioFinger. The goal of this study is to investigate the capability characteristics of biometric systems in the ongoing discussion regarding integration of biometric features in personnel documents such as IDcards and Visa application documents. Thus the designed test has the focus on performance testing of selected algorithms and systems with dedicated investigations on side effects such as independence of matching rates and results from the scanning device or dependability of received operator characteristics from aging effects. The project is carried out in close collaboration between Federal Bureau of Criminal Investigation (Bundeskriminalamt, BKA), the Federal Office for Information Security (Bundesamt für Sicherheit in der Informationstechnik, BSI) and the Fraunhofer-IGD.