(7 August 2007 – UK) The British passport office has reportedly been co-operating with financial services companies to run security checks on customers.A report in the UK media said banks and other financial services companies were saving many thousands of pounds each year by using the passport office to validate and cross-reference customer provided data.
The Identity and Passport Service in the UK said the service has been operating a hotline service for a year and it was proving successful with financial services companies.
The UK Data Protection Act stipulates that the passport service is not able to distribute information on people’s passports but it can check and validate passport information provided to banks.
The service has so far led to several arrests and more than 200 stolen or forged passports being confiscated by authorities.