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No matter how locked down your identity information is, there’s probably a gaping hole in your security efforts: your car. Just like you, your car is linked to a few numbers. Unlike you, it rolls around with those numbers—your license plate number and the vehicle’s VIN—out in the open. Your car’s identity is even more vulnerable than yours, and that vulnerability can have a huge negative impact on you. Here’s what to know about car identity theft and how to protect your vehicle.
Plates and VINs
Your car’s public identity is tied to two things, its license plate number and vehicle identification number (VIN). The license plates are on display by law, making it easy to copy down—or just steal outright—and your car’s VIN is often displayed on the dashboard, or in other easily accessible locations on the car (as well as your title, registration, and insurance documentation).
With your license plates and VIN, criminals can do some real damage to your life by running a few basic scams:
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VIN swapping. Thieves can use your car’s VIN when they have a stolen or damaged car to sell. Swapping in your VIN for the real one can erase flood or accident damage or hide the fact that the car is stolen. After a private cash sale (usually on a platform like Facebook Marketplace), the thieves vanish and the new owner is stuck. For example, a couple in Ohio lost $33,000 when they unknowingly purchased a car with a swapped VIN via Facebook Marketplace.
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Hacking. VINs are useful for modern cars, because they can help hackers figure out everything they need to access the car’s software (you can see some of the information encoded in it here). Manufacturers use VINs to generate access codes, and the VINs encode information about where and when the car was built, which hackers can use to figure out what version of the software they’re dealing with—along with the known exploits and vulnerabilities.
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Stolen cars. Stolen license plates can be placed on stolen cars so the plate numbers don’t ping law enforcement at red light camera, speed cameras, or toll booths.
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Toll and ticket evasion. Stolen license plates can also be used to evade automatic tolls or to avoid paying tickets. A thief can brazenly rack up violations that accrue to your vehicle, leaving you holding the (expensive) bag.
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Identity theft. While your car’s license plate number can’t allow thieves to steal your identity directly, it can be used as part of an information-gathering scheme with the goal of stealing your identity. Your vehicle’s make and model, your home address, accident history, and other pieces of information can be accessed and used as breadcrumbs to discover even more information about you.
Protect your numbers
Unfortunately, there’s not much you can physically do to protect your car’s identity. You can’t legally obscure your license plates, and while you can likely get away with hiding the VIN if it’s embossed on the dashboard (by covering it with tape, a piece of paper, or a file folder) when the car is parked in a public place, you can usually look up a vehicle’s VIN if you have the license plate number, so this is only a partial deterrent.
What you can do is take basic precautions and pay attention:
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Check the VIN. You can check your VIN’s history at the National Insurance Crime Bureau’s website to see if it’s been involved in any fraud. You should do this regularly to make sure that no one’s using your car’s VIN for shady purposes. The sooner you’re aware, the less damage it will do.
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Park inside. Keeping your car off the street as much as possible can help make it more challenging for people to copy down your VIN or steal your license plates. If you have the option to keep your vehicle in a locked garage, that’s your best bet.
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Avoid sharing. There are many instances where you’ll need to provide the VIN (when selling the car, for example). You can ask if the full VIN is really needed, or if you can just give out the last few digits as you can with your Social Security number, thus keeping the full VIN out of as many records as possible. You can also offer to provide a vehicle history report from a reputable company that doesn’t include the VIN.
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Secure the plates. Use tamper-proof screws or an anti-theft license plate cover to make it difficult for thieves to steal the plates off your car.