A number of genetic systems for human genetic identification based on short tandem repeats or single nucleotide polymorphisms are widely used for crime detection, kinship studies and in analysis of victims of mass disasters. Here, we have developed a new set of 32 molecular genetic markers for human genetic identification based on polymorphic retroelement insertions. Allele frequencies were determined in a group of 90 unrelated individuals from four genetically distant populations of the Russian Federation. The mean match probability and probability of paternal exclusion, calculated based on population data, were 5.53 × 10 14 and 99.784%, respectively. The developed system is cheap and easy to use as compared to all previously published methods. The application of fluorescence-based methods for allele discrimination allows to use the human genetic identification set in automatic and high-throughput formats. © 2010 Macmillan Publishers Limited All rights reserved.