Thread: UK: 24 boxes of stolen blank passports are worth £2.5m

24 boxes of stolen blank passports are worth £2.5m
CAROLYN CHURCHILL July 30 2008
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Passports stolen in a raid on a delivery van are worth £2.5m on the black market, police said yesterday.

The blank passports, which were inside 24 brown cardboard boxes, were taken after thieves hijacked the van when the driver stopped off to get a newspaper at a shop in Oldham, Greater Manchester, on Monday morning.

One of the raiders jumped in while the driver was away from the vehicle and a second delivery man sitting in the van was attacked before the offender sped off in the vehicle. The theft sparked calls for a public inquiry yesterday, with Keith Vaz, chairman of the Commons Home Affairs Committee, calling for a "full-scale" investigation into passport security in the UK.

Detective Chief Inspector Bill McGreavy, of Greater Manchester Police, said the "actual value" of the passports, which were destined for British embassies, is around £2.5m.

The blank passports and vignettes - blank stickers for visa stamps - were stolen from the vehicle while it was travelling from Oldham, Greater Manchester, to RAF Northolt, near London.

A reported 3000 documents printed at 3M Security Printing & Systems were taken when the raiders struck in Long Lane, Chadderton, shortly before 6.40am on Monday. The passports involved were the new electronic type which contain a chip replicating the data printed on the document itself. However, security experts said that the passports could be used to commit fraud.

Former Scotland Yard fraud officer Tom Craig, who now runs ID security company Amarlis, said: "They can be used by putting in biographical information of your own, not necessarily getting the chip information right, and then you can use them to open up bank accounts or actually get employment. Bearing in mind that these passports can be used anywhere in the world, if they come to the UK they are more likely to be picked up because the serial numbers will be recorded."

A spokeswoman for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, which was responsible for the delivery of the passports, admitted it was a serious breach of security but said that the Home Office and Identity and Passport Service (IPS) had taken "preventative action" to guard against forgeries. An IPS spokesman said: "Our hi-tech security features mean that these passports are unusable."

However, Mr Vaz, Labour MP for Leicester East, said he was writing to the Home Secretary to request a full-scale inquiry into passport security. "I find it extraordinary that the theft of so many passports was even possible," he said.

"This government has put the eradication of illegal immigration at the top of the political agenda. It is therefore completely unacceptable that such sensitive documents are transported in a way that puts them at risk of theft."

Security arrangements for the movement of passports are normally overseen by the Home Office through a sub-contracted security firm. The department said drivers were not allowed unauthorised stops and sensitive documents were transported in armoured or secure vehicles.

However, as these passports were going to embassies the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) was responsible for delivery, according to the Home Office.

Mr McGreavy said that police were looking for at least two suspects. He described one suspect as a tanned male with an English accent and dark hair. He said this description related to a man who held open the passenger side door of the delivery van.
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I just wonder how many blank passports have gone out our doors, which would probably be politically incorrect.

Can someone steal my birth certification from the elitist government? I do not want them to know me any longer? Impossible, I know