The large horizontal extent, location in the cold upper troposphere, and ice composition make cirrus clouds important modulators of the earths radiation budget and climate. Cirrus cloud microphysical properties are difficult to measure and model because they are inhomogeneous in nature and their ice crystal size distribution and habit are not well characterized. Accurate retrievals of cloud properties are crucial for improving the representation of cloud scale processes in large-scale models and for accurately predicting the earths future climate. A number of passive and active remote sensing retrievals exist for estimating the microphysical properties of upper tropospheric clouds. We believe significant progress has been made in the evolution of these retrieval algorithms in the last decade; however, there is room for improvement. Members of the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement program (ARM) Cloud Properties Working Group are involved in an intercomparison of optical depth (tau), ice water path, and characteristic particle size in ice clouds retrieved using ground-based instruments. The goals of this intercomparison are to evaluate the accuracy of state-of-the-art algorithms, quantify the uncertainties, and make recommendations for improvement. Currently, there is significant scatter in the algorithms for difficult clouds with very small optical depths (tau1). The good news is that for thin cirrus (0.3