Financial Cryptography

Fake Ids - comprehensive prices

When I was at CAcert, one of the risk analysis questions was how much it costs to provide a fake set of Identity documents. So I started collecting public references to that, and fairly quickly came up with a number -- 1000 as the cost for a good set.

That's a great number as a rule of thumb for risk analysis -- don't build a system that spends 10,000 to protect something that can be stolen for a tenth of that.

Now (via Zerohedge) someone else has picked up my slack and published a lot of info on this cost. Here comes Havocscope!

Prices of Stolen Passports and Fake IDs

Average Price of a Stolen Passport for Sale	$3,500
Black Market Driver License – New Jersey	$2,500 to $7,000
Black Market Passport – Nepal	$6,961
Black Market Passport – Peru	$1,750
Black Market Passport – Sweden	$12,200
Black Market Passport and Visa – Australia	$15,000
Blank Stolen Passport – UK	$1,642
Fake Green Card	$75 to $300
Fake Birth Certificate – Cuba	$10,000 to $50,000
Fake Car License Plate in Cambodia	$4.50 to $10
Fake Driver License – California	$200
Fake Driver License – Confiscated in New York	1,450 in 2012
Fake ID Card – Malaysia	$771 (includes smuggling)
Fake ID Card – New York	$160 in 90 min
Fake ID Confiscated – Arizona	2,064 from students in 2010
Fake ID Confiscated from China	1,700 in 3 months at one airport
Fake ID from China	$300 for 1, $400 for 2
Fake ID Papers for Residency – USA	$2,500 per set
Fake IDs for Sale – United States	$0.1 Billion ($100 Million)
Fake Passport – Australia	$806
Fake Passport – China	$10,000 to $25,000
Fake Passport – China (Alter Photo)	$3,500 to $5,000
Fake Passport – Egypt, Germany, Morocco	$6,830 to Syrian Refugees
Fake Passport in Thailand – Basic	$245 in 2 hours
Fake Passport in Thailand – Higher Quality	$1,000 to $1,250
Fake Passports in India	$294
Fake Social Security Card	$75 to $300
Lost or Stolen Passport Reported	11 Million in 2010
Passport Selling – Thailand	$200
Stolen ID to buy Health Insurance	$1,250

At this stage I can hang up my hat - these guys are doing a better job. But before I retire, I might ask one question - what's up with Cuba? Why does a false birth certificate cost so much? And, they have the answer:

Price to Get a Fake Birth Certificate from Cuba

A man in the US State of Florida was selling counterfeit Cuban birth certificates to illegal immigrants in the United States. Due to US immigration policy, Cuban nationals are able to apply for a green card after one year of being in the country.

The man was selling fake Cuban birth certificates to migrants from Argentina, Colombia, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Mexico, Peru and Venezuela. Each migrant was already in the United States illegally, and paid between $10,000 to $50,000 for the fake documents. By possessing the fake Cuban birth certificates, the migrants attempted to pass off as Cuban nationals to US immigration officials.

According to court documents, the man sold around 50 fake birth certificates and made over $500,000.

Answered! Looks like I'm out of a job! Maybe I should take up forging Cuban birth certificates... Or, go chase these guys who organised a hit in Bahrain using false ID:

The price of a hit is also tracked by Havocscope, but now we're getting off track.

Posted by iang at August 13, 2015 09:02 PM