Abstract: A method of fingerprint verification includes determining a direction difference between a direction pattern of an input fingerprint and a direction pattern of a registered fingerprint and comparing the determined direction difference with predetermined upper and lower threshold values. The input and registered fingerprints are considered the same if the direction difference is lower than the lower threshold value, and the input and registered fingerprints are considered to be different if the direction difference is higher than the upper threshold value. If the direction different is between the upper and lower threshold values, minutiae of the input and registered fingerprints are extracted for verifying the input fingerprint. The extracting includes preprocessing of the input fingerprint image, uniboundary extraction of the input fingerprint minutiae, and restoration to eliminate pseudo-minutiae.