This paper addresses the problem of developing an automated system for postmortem identification using dental records. The Automated Dental Identification System (ADIS) can be used by law enforcement agencies to locate missing persons using databases of dental x-rays. Currently, this search and identification process is carried out manually, which makes it very time consuming and unreliable. In this paper, we propose an architecture for ADIS, we define the functionality of its components, and we briefly describe some of the techniques used in realizing these components.