UV-reactive ink can be both visible and invisible to the naked eye. When subjected to ultra-violet light, it can fluoresce in a variety of colours which can also vary according to the different wavelengths of light used in the control process. UV-reactive ink is a regular feature found in identity documents; and controlling documents under UV light is a common practice at front line controls, particularly at the border. Intaglio ink creates an emboss effect where the ink is raised above and sits on top of the paper.
Fugitive inks
will run, bleach, change colour or disappear altogether when they come into contact with other fluids – especially those that may be used in forgery. Thermochromic inks can change colour or altogether disappear when exposed to different temperatures. Simply placing a finger to raise the temperature on an ink-based feature can make it disappear, only for it to reappear when the ink cools down.
» Security Printing
Rainbow printing is a common feature smoothly transitioning and merging colours from one to another and remains difficult for even today’s advanced digital scanners to accurately copy. Extra Small Print is, as the name suggests, exceptionally small print that can only be properly read under magnification. Guilloche printing is one of the most decorative features creating detailed images through interweaving finely curved lines across passport pages or laminates. Other features, such as latent images created by the intaglio ink process, are often only revealed by reviewing the document at an oblique angle.
» Holographic Devices
Common to credit cards and other secure documents, holographic devices are also found in a large number of passports, often in a metallic form in kinegrams or within the laminate of the document itself.
A Bulgarian passport with a partially demetallised Kinegram
» Laminates
The biographic data page of a passport is the most vulnerable – and valuable – to document forgery. With the advancement of document security features, such as the use of complex
The biodata page of a German passport with an identigram
The biographic data page contains its own set of features from the perspective of data integrity. The type of Optical Character Recognition (OCR) font used to display the data is a security feature in and of itself. Rules establish the value of particular “checksum references” that need to appear in specific areas of the document’s Machine Readable Zone (MRZ) – the two lines of alphanumeric data and chevrons on the bottom of the data page. And key biographic data found in the “visible zone” of the data page is also reproduced, in part, in the MRZ by applying the rules set out in ICAO Document 9303.
» Biometrics
Without doubt, biometrics are the most talked-about security feature of modern passports.
All of the document security
A holographic overlay protects information recorded on plastic (Credit: Holography, Ukraine)
30 Download your FREE ASI "iPad/iPhone APP" NOW
features listed above – and there are many more than those mentioned – provide an exceptional level of security to protect the integrity of travel and identity documents. Importantly, these features make counterfeit and forgery considerably more difficult which is the principal reason they were designed in the first place – to prevent and detect document fraud. Biometrics take document security features to a whole new level by linking the identity of the document to certain physical characteristics unique to the holder – such as their face, fingerprints or iris patterns. Most common among these today is the inclusion of a high-resolution digital image of the holder’s passport photograph.
By securely interrogating the April 2013 Aviationsecurityinternational
laminates, laser perforation and the inclusion of optically variable devices (OVDs), it is becoming increasingly difficult to perform many of the older forgery techniques such as removing and replacing the holder’s photo. Laminates contain both visible and invisible safeguards and can incorporate exceptionally thin and delicate layers of microfilm which easily crack and tear to reveal evidence of tampering.
» Biographic Data Page
“…criminal organisations will focus their efforts on obtaining genuine travel documents by illegitimate means. This may come in the form of presenting false breeder documents, such as a fake birth certificate…”
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48