Police warn over rise in car cloning as stolen vehicles get legitimate identities
Police warn that car cloning is rising, with stolen vehicles given legitimate identities, leaving victims facing fines, penalty points and criminal investigations.
The Full Story
A plain summary built from the channels that reported this story.
Police have warned about a rise in car cloning, a fraud where stolen vehicles are given the identities of legitimate cars. A car is stolen every 10 minutes in the UK, and criminals are increasingly using cloning to cover their tracks. The practice can leave victims facing fines, penalty points and even criminal investigations.
Cloning involves copying identifying features from a legitimate vehicle and applying them to a stolen one. This can include number plates, making a stolen car look like a legitimate vehicle. Police say they are seeing more and more cloned cars on the roads, with many people buying them through online platforms and social media.
Victims described the impact. Caroline saved up for her dream camper van and paid in cash because it looked legitimate. She found out a few days later that it was actually stolen. She said she had never heard of cloning and could not understand how she had been tricked out of money she had saved. James was on holiday when his car was stolen from outside his home. Police later told him it was still being driven around under cloned plates. He said he was disgusted, upset and angry. Christine's car was cloned without her knowledge. She only found out after receiving multiple fines from somebody else's illegal driving.
Criminals are not only changing number plates. They are also faking log books and changing vehicle identity numbers, known as VINs. Every car has a 17 digit VIN. It appears in the windscreen and in other places, such as stamped into the floor in front of the driver's seat. The number should match the registration number. Even when all the numbers match, a car can still be cloned.
Buyers are advised to look for red flags. They should ask whether the price is about right or seems too cheap. They should be wary if a seller becomes evasive when asked probing questions about ownership, if they push for cash, or if they cannot prove that the address where they meet is theirs. The advice is to look at the big picture and protect your money.
Caroline, James and Christine are sharing their stories in the hope that other buyers will not make the same mistake.
On screen
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Key Claims
Claims reported during this story's coverage, grouped by how many channels reported each one. Select a dot to see the source excerpt.
| Claim |  |
|---|---|
| Only on one channel | |
| A car is stolen every 10 minutes in the UK. | |
| Police report a rise in cloned cars, often sold through online platforms and social media, with criminals falsifying log books and altering VIN numbers and number plates. | |
Channel Perspectives
What each channel focused on, with key quotes.
This BBC One West broadcast carried a police warning about car cloning as a consumer and crime story. It focused on how cloning works, with a two-car demonstration and practical buyer advice, and gave significant space to three victims. The tone was cautionary and victim-centred, with no challenge to police figures or competing perspective from the motor trade.
- “a car is stolen every 10 minutes in the UK and criminals are increasingly using a scam called cloning to cover their tracks.”
- “These are two almost identical cars, so make, model and colour. But in this scenario, the car on my left has just been stolen and now all the identifying features from the car on my right will be copied and cloned onto this one, including the number plate, hiding the fact it's stolen.”
- “You need to look out for the red flags. Is the car about the right price? Does it seem too cheap?”
Broadcast Timeline
News broadcasts tracked for this story, in time order.