Surrogate heuristic identification is described, including a memory configured to store data associated with an image, and a processor configured to select a portion of an image, and the portion is standardized, to identify a characteristic associated with the image, to use the characteristic to generate a data representation, the data representation being used to provide heuristic data, and to process the heuristic data to generate a fingerprint configured to compare against one or more stored fingerprints associated with other images.