Closing the Voters’ Roll Fraud Loophole

Fraud consultants at FICO have warmly welcomed the announcement on 30th June 2011 by Mark Harper, the British minister for political and constitutional reform, to change the process by which households register to vote in the UK.

Currently households register as one to vote, which has allowed people to be falsely added to the electoral roll either as fictitious identities or as genuine identities but without the individual's knowledge. The electoral roll has long been used by financial institutions to check the authenticity of credit and account applicants, and to help fulfil the bank's responsibilities under the anti-money laundering/Know Your Customer regulations. But it has been the subject of significant criticism over its integrity for many years.

Now, new voters will be required to register individually by providing their date of birth and National Insurance number before they are included on the electoral roll, starting in 2014. Existing voters will need to re-register using the same process but will have until after the next general election in May 2015 to do so.