Registration fraud: thousands of authorized professionals suspended or excluded every year

The partial privatization of the vehicle registration system (SIV) in 2017, the management of which was completely centralized by the prefectures passed into the hands of authorized automobile professionals (garages, dealers, etc.) by State services, creates “a gaping loophole” encouraging “massive and systematic fraud” according to a Le Monde investigation

published this Wednesday. The SIV is used by law enforcement to find the owner of a vehicle, check the validity of insurance and technical inspection, or know who to send speeding tickets to.

How widespread is the fraud?

Of the 34,000 companies authorized as “trusted third parties”, many of them are only “fictitious” operators, our colleagues report. It must be said that around 4,000 authorized professionals are suspended or excluded from the system each year, according to the road safety delegation, which judges the extent of fraud (difficult, in fact, to really estimate) to be low. compared to the large number of operations on the SIV”. The latter reveals that “reflections are underway on the authorization criteria with the ultimate aim of preventing the authorization of unscrupulous professionals, without penalizing serious professionals”.

Harmful drifts

In addition to garages and dealerships, “thousands” of individuals unrelated to the automobile trade, with a microenterprise that allows them to obtain the precious authorization, take advantage of this to monetize their access to the SIV. All kinds of abuses ensue: change of registration document without searching for the previous holder, with the risk of identity theft, sometimes in the pay of criminal groups who seek to re-register stolen vehicles, avoid taxes, or escape point withdrawals and fines…