Fake or altered VIN: how to spot it before buying

The VIN is the car's ID card. Whoever alters it usually wants one of two things: to sell a stolen car with "clean" papers, or to hide the past of a damaged car under the identity of another one. For the buyer, the result is the same: the police can seize the car at the first check, and the money is hard to recover.

The good news: an altered VIN almost always leaves traces. Below, step by step, is where to look, which signs to watch for and what to do if you find something.

How a VIN gets faked

• Re-stamping: the original number on the body is ground off and a different one is stamped over it.
• Cloning: a stolen car receives the VIN and papers of an identical car, usually a damaged or scrapped one. On paper, everything looks fine.
• Swapped labels: the plate behind the windscreen or the door label is replaced with one taken from another car.
• Patching: the piece of body carrying the VIN is cut from a donor car and welded onto another.

Where the VIN must match

The same VIN, character for character, must appear in every place below. If you don't know where each one is on your model, the usual locations are in our guide on where to find the VIN.

• the plate visible through the windscreen, at the bottom;
• the number stamped into the body (under the bonnet, in the floor or under a seat, depending on the model);
• the label on the door pillar or in the engine bay;
• the vehicle registration documents;
• on many modern cars, in the car's control units as well, where an authorised workshop can read it with a diagnostic tool.

Physical signs of an altered VIN

Look at the stamped number with a torch, from different angles. Factory characters have the same depth, the same spacing and the same font. Stop if you see:

• characters of different depths, crooked alignment or fonts that don't match each other;
• shinier metal, newer paint, filler or grinding marks around the number;
• weld marks or a patch of sheet metal that doesn't match the rest of the body;
• a windscreen plate held by rivets that differ from the originals, scratched or slightly crooked;
• a door label peeling at the edges, reprinted or missing altogether.

A missing door label doesn't automatically mean fraud (it can tear during a repair), but it is a reason to check everything else twice as carefully.

The check digit: a test that takes seconds

On many cars, the character in position 9 is a check digit calculated from the other characters. An invented or mistyped VIN usually fails the test. Not every European manufacturer uses this digit, so a failed result is not proof of fraud, but it is a signal to look more closely. The free VIN decoder checks the structure of the number and shows you which car left the factory under that code.

Mismatches in the papers and in the history

Cloning is the hardest to spot on the body, because the VIN is real, it just belongs to another car. This is where comparing what the VIN says with what you see in front of you helps:

• the decoding shows a different colour, engine, gearbox type or year than the actual car;
• the factory equipment doesn't match the features in the car;
• the history shows a total loss or a scrapping, while the car in front of you looks intact;
• the mileage in the history doesn't fit the real wear of the steering wheel, pedals and seats (see also the signs of a rolled-back odometer).

A VIN report brings the damage records, mileage readings and theft check together in one place, so you can compare them with the car. See a sample report and, separately, the stolen car check.