A study analyzing 2.8 million financial transactions carried out in October 2024 using the new National Identity Card (CIN) found that only 0.2% showed any signs of fraud.
According to the study, the data indicates that the risk of the new document being used in scams is just 0.08%, lower than other types of identification, such as the old RG or the National Driver’s License (CNH), whose fraud risks hover around 3.8%.
The study was conducted by Serasa Experian for g1.
🔎 The new National Identity Card will replace the RG by 2032. The main change is that the CIN uses a unique number nationwide, which is the same as the CPF number.
Previously, the RG number was generated by the issuing state, allowing the same person to have different identification numbers if they obtained RGs in multiple states.
Despite security improvements, police officers working with identity verification state that the CIN still needs to evolve to include a national biometric database (read more below).
Célio Ribeiro, Executive President of InterID, highlighted the importance of CIN in strengthening security and combating fraud: “The CIN is a crucial tool in fighting various types of fraud and is part of a complex Identification System aimed at national integration through a Public Digital Infrastructure. This will ensure a modern, efficient, secure, and citizen-focused process in Brazil.”
Study
According to the data collected by Serasa, 38.68% of fraud indicators in financial transactions were related to document alterations.
Possible photo overlay by fraudsters was found in 8.9% of cases, while the use of a third-party document (possibly stolen or lost) accounted for 8.44%.
According to Serasa, these crimes involve two main methods:
- Altering real documents by manually overlaying a photo or using Artificial Intelligence to approximate the original image.
- Creating fake documents that already contain the fraudster’s photo but with valid information from a real victim (name, CPF, date of birth, parentage, etc.).
“With document alterations, what we call ‘identity theft’ or ‘identity fraud’ occurs, where the fraudster uses technology to ‘assume’ the victim’s identity, pretending to be them in order to, for example, obtain credit in their name,” explains Caio Rocha, Director of Authentication and Fraud Prevention at Serasa Experian.
National Biometric Database
A Federal Police delegate and a São Paulo Civil Police delegate interviewed by g1 stated that, despite the CIN’s progress in establishing a single nationwide identification number, the federal government has yet to create a national biometric database for all citizens.
According to the police, only with such a database could authorities prevent a malicious individual from obtaining multiple identity cards under different numbers and names.
Currently, each state has its own biometric database, but these state systems are not interconnected.
If a national biometric database existed, any citizen would be recognized in any state when applying for an identity card, allowing authorities to verify whether the person truly owns the name and CPF number they are declaring.
However, the federal government has not yet determined how to implement this national biometric database.
One possibility is to create a single database hosting data from all state Identification Institutes. Another option is to use databases from private companies that have already been collecting fingerprint data from their customers—a solution often criticized by law enforcement officers.
The implementation of the new CIN is overseen by the Ministry of Management and Innovation in Public Services. The ministry stated last year that “the matter is still being discussed within the Federal Citizen Identification Executive Committee (CEFIC).”
According to the federal government, by December 2024, more than 17 million people had already obtained the new CIN.
