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Fake IDs in the age of the internet

melmagazine.com

51–60 of 201 posts

Re: Fake IDs in the age of the internet

#51

The mass use of fake IDs of this sort is a bizarrely American problem. In the UK, you're considered an adult at age 18. Most (aside from the unfortunate 17-year-olds) university students can legally purchase alcohol, smoke, or gamble if they so choose. But we don't have MADD, I guess.

When I was younger than 18, many of my friends had fake IDs to buy alcohol.

Re: Fake IDs in the age of the internet

#52

The mass use of fake IDs of this sort is a bizarrely American problem. In the UK, you're considered an adult at age 18. Most (aside from the unfortunate 17-year-olds) university students can legally purchase alcohol, smoke, or gamble if they so choose. But we don't have MADD, I guess.

Your bizarreness may be misplaced. American 18-year-olds can smoke and gamble. I don't see how 18 prevents fake ids from 16 and 17 year olds though.

18 year olds can only gamble a bit: Some states have the ages set at 21, and I guess if the casino serves alcohol on the gambling floor, they must be 21 to go there. They can buy lottery tickets. I'm not sure how things like betting on horse races works, though.

And it doesn't, but it can be slightly harder for a 16-17 year old to get a fake ID without alerting their parents.

Re: Fake IDs in the age of the internet

#53

The mass use of fake IDs of this sort is a bizarrely American problem. In the UK, you're considered an adult at age 18. Most (aside from the unfortunate 17-year-olds) university students can legally purchase alcohol, smoke, or gamble if they so choose. But we don't have MADD, I guess.

In Greece, we don't check IDs for alcohol use (in practice. I think we're supposed to be doing it, nowadays). There are also no on-premises laws for alcohol. I think that's mostly because the culture is different, as people don't generally drink to get drunk like in other countries. You won't see the round-after-round drinking that you see in the UK or US, people will generally buy one or two drinks, and will rarely…

Pardon my ignorance, but why drink if not to get 'drunk'? Alcohol doesn't taste very nice, so the only advantage I get out of it is that I feel more of a 'buzz'. Is it common just to drink as if it were something that tastes nice, like juice?

Re: Fake IDs in the age of the internet

#54

The mass use of fake IDs of this sort is a bizarrely American problem. In the UK, you're considered an adult at age 18. Most (aside from the unfortunate 17-year-olds) university students can legally purchase alcohol, smoke, or gamble if they so choose. But we don't have MADD, I guess.

Whenever I read "in the UK" these days my mind wanders to how BREXIT will affect it ?

It won't. You are buying into the mass hysteria.

The UK was perfectly fine before the maastricht treaty and will be in 2 years time.

Re: Fake IDs in the age of the internet

#55
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same thing with weapons. Go shoot automatic rifles with the government, oh you want to buy hand gun ammunition? Sorry you can't, have to be 21.

Depends on the state, but Federal law does require you to be 21 or older to purchase a handgun. Ammunition can be sold without any background checks or ID checks in some states.

21 to purchase from a retail, I believe it's still 18 to purchase from an individual, making it even more backwards.

Re: Fake IDs in the age of the internet

#56
post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Greece, we don't check IDs for alcohol use (in practice. I think we're supposed to be doing it, nowadays). There are also no on-premises laws for alcohol. I think that's mostly because the culture is different, as people don't generally drink to get drunk like in other countries. You won't see the round-after-round drinking that you see in the UK or US, people will generally buy one or two drinks, and will rarely…

Pardon my ignorance, but why drink if not to get 'drunk'? Alcohol doesn't taste very nice, so the only advantage I get out of it is that I feel more of a 'buzz'. Is it common just to drink as if it were something that tastes nice, like juice?

Not everyone shares your opinion on alcohol not tasting very nice.

Re: Fake IDs in the age of the internet

#57

This reminds me of back in the day when someone broke into the Ohio DMV and stole the machine that made the IDs and starting making exact "fake" IDs.

I think this is why Indiana quit printing ID's in the county offices. They are now printed in a central location in Indianapolis and arrive in the mail.

Re: Fake IDs in the age of the internet

#58

The mass use of fake IDs of this sort is a bizarrely American problem. In the UK, you're considered an adult at age 18. Most (aside from the unfortunate 17-year-olds) university students can legally purchase alcohol, smoke, or gamble if they so choose. But we don't have MADD, I guess.

I think a big part of the problem is that America is very large and very car focused. If you can reasonably walk to where you're drinking (or more importantly, walk home from there), then you're less likely to drive drunk. Many bars in America essentially require driving to and from.

Re: Fake IDs in the age of the internet

#59
post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Compared to what? I've seen much simpler driver's licenses from other countries. Up until recently (2013 maybe) the French driver's license was literally a piece of pink paper with a picture glued to it. http://flawlessfakeids.com/wp-content/uploads/French-Fake-Dr...

Compared to Germany for example with a bunch of holograms and whatnot: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/dd/DE_Licen... In contrast to e.g. the French, our drivers licence is a valid means of identification though.

That looks similar to many of the new US state IDs due to increased security requirements of REAL ID. My Washington, DC license has a holograms and a neat translucent panel where you can see my photo if you hold it up to the light. I would guess it is very hard to fake.

Re: Fake IDs in the age of the internet

#60
post #28
post #2

I've been interested in this topic for a while. The article was fairly good but I did have a few minor quibbles. For one, ordering from IDGod (the vendor in the story) is known to be very reliable. If packages get stopped at customs, a customer can contact support to get a replacement shipped at no charge. Additionally, the advanced scanner BarZapp is pretty much a non-issue. Almost any ID purchased from vendors on t…

How will a fake id pass BarZapp? According to the article (I know nothing about this, so could be wrong) it looks up the id in a database and returns the name and dob of the owner. How could the made-up name be in the database? Or are they cloning existing IDs, and the buyer doesn't get a choice in the name?

I believe the apps only pull whatever information is in the barcode on the back of the idea - only law enforcement can actually check the ID against the DMV database.

I scanned the 2-D barcode on my license using a generic barcode reader on my phone, and it's a PDF417 barcode that contains all the information that's printed on my id (number, name, address, license type, physical descriptors, dates, organ donor) as well as a few other fields (revision number of the card format, and an inventory control number that looks like the concatenation of the DL number, state name, license type, and some other fields)

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