This article presents proposals to improve the security, safety, and management of biometric systems, and the privacy of system users. First, a standard system heartbeat message is proposed for monitoring the safety, security, performance, and availability of distributed telebiometric devices, and for alerting system administrators to security and safety events and changes. Next, an event journal standard is proposed for the collection of data needed to manage the safe and secure operation of telebiometric devices. Third, a cryptographic message schema standard is proposed for the protection of event journals, heartbeat messages, biometric reference templates, and other telebiometric information using digital signature, encryption, and signcryption techniques. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]