Department of Internal Affairs passport verification. Check your passport for validity at the Federal Migration Service

The need to check the authenticity of a Russian citizen’s passport may arise in various cases: hiring, applying for a loan, issuing a private loan, concluding a contract, registering a housing lease, etc. Today, you can check your passport for authenticity quite simply, without contacting special services directly.

If you have access to a computer, you can check your passport for authenticity on the Internet on the website of the Federal Migration Service of Russia services.fms.gov.ru. To do this, you need to enter the number and series of the document, the date of its issue in the specified fields and repeat the set of numbers at the request of the system. If the passport with the specified data is valid and no loss has been reported regarding it, the system will confirm the authenticity of the document.

However, confirmation that a passport with the specified number, series, and date of issue actually exists does not guarantee that it is not counterfeit. The fact is that the photograph may have been replaced, or it may simply have fallen into the hands of a stranger, and for some reason the owner did not report it to the police. The easiest way to fake a passport is to replace the photograph. Therefore, you need to take a close look at the accuracy of the design of the photo and the entire page as a whole. There are cases when criminals paste a new photo over or instead of an existing one, and then re-lamine the page. It is also possible that the entire page may be fake, pasted over the old one.

If the passport has a stamp indicating that the document is subject to exchange, this also indicates that the passport is invalid. Using a special colorless paint that appears under the influence of UV radiation, the word “PASSPORT” is written on page 2, and “RUSSIA” in large letters in the center on page 3. In addition, page 3 is covered with a laminating film, red lines and patterns are applied to it, repeating the words “Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia.” Since 2011, a new lamination film with the inscription “RF” and a hologram has been used. A special three-tone regularly repeating watermark “RF” must be visible on all pages of the passport.

• Passports of the new type are issued from 07/01/2011. Their main difference is the presence on the third page below the photograph of a machine-readable inscription containing basic information about the owner of the document:
• type of document (in our case, internal passport);
• the state where the document was issued;
• last name, first name, patronymic of the owner of the document;
• series, passport number;
• citizenship of the document owner;
• date of birth, gender of citizen;
• document expiration date;

Additional information.

Naturally, it is worth checking the information in the passport for inconsistencies and typos (for example, an illogical year of birth, the seal of a different department than the one that issued the document, etc.). One should be confused by a too neat passport, issued many years ago and, on the contrary, a very shabby one. And the fact of being issued at an address followed by registration there a few years later may indicate the criminal past of the passport owner.

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Passport authentication

The necessity (or reality) is associated with the increasing cases of forgery of this document. There are many ways to check. Which ones? How long does it take?

Where can I check?

• Checking the validity of a Russian citizen’s passport can be done in the following ways:

The verification is carried out according to the following principle: when entering passport data, it is checked against existing passports in the migration service system, which are currently not used by anyone. If the passport is fake, the system will confirm the similarity of one of the system with the passport of the citizen who entered it.

This method does not confirm the authenticity of the passport 100%.

• At the office of the Federal Migration Service. To do this, you will have to fill out a special application and then expect the result within thirty days;
• Personally, having examined the passport of a citizen of the Russian Federation.

The authenticity of the document will be confirmed by the following signs:

• Watermarks should be visible on the second page of the passport, and if you examine the second page under an ultraviolet lamp, then under the phrase “Russian Federation” the name of the document will be clearly visible, namely “Passport”;
• The third page must be laminated;
• All passport information must be entered electronically and not by hand (except for the inscription on permanent registration of a citizen of the Russian Federation);

To do this, you need to open your passport and look at the 2nd page. You should be able to spot the watermarks without difficulty. If you illuminate this page with ultraviolet light, then under the words “Russian Federation” you can see the word: “PASSPORT”. The third page of the passport is always laminated, decorated with a coat of arms and the words “Russia” and “RF”. All entries in the passport (with the exception of the mark on registration of place of residence, which may contain handwritten text) are entered into the passport by typewriting.

• All pages have a "grid" pattern;
• The outer cover contains a cord underneath;
• All pages of the passport must be clear, without streaks (unless this is due to operating conditions), and not differ in color.

You can check the authenticity of your passport on our website online by filling out the form below.

Checking passports of Russian citizens

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Alexander Eremeev

Experience as a lawyer - since 2005. Graduated from the Moscow State Open University with honors. Private practice, specialization - migration and civil law.

A passport of a citizen of the Russian Federation may be invalid for various reasons. Your passport may expire, be lost, stolen, or invalidated due to processing errors. In all such cases, documents generated on the basis of such passport data may lose legal force. To avoid risks of this kind, it is necessary to check the signatory’s passport.

How to check

Passport verification in the Kontur.Focus service occurs immediately after entering 10 digits (4 digits - passport series, 6 digits - passport number). Entered spaces are not taken into account, so you can enter the series and passport number as one number without spaces. After entering the data, the system automatically checks this passport against the database and displays information about the verification: whether this passport is present or not in the list of invalid ones.

Data sources

Information about invalid Russian passports is downloaded daily from the database of the Main Directorate for Migration Issues of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation (formerly the FMS). The list of invalid passports is constantly updated and contains more than 100 million entries.

The need to check a passport for validity may arise not only from police officers, but also from organizations and people not associated with such activities. When applying for loans, banks check the validity of the passport. In order to avoid becoming a victim of fraudulent actions that are committed using forged documents, it would be a good idea to check the passport of the person who is one of the parties to the purchase and sale of real estate or rental housing. When hiring, the employer is interested in hiring a person with a real document and not a fake one.

There are several options for checking your passport:

• Online request on the website of the Main Department of Migration Affairs of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (former FMS - ed.);
• An official request to the Main Directorate for Migration Affairs of the Ministry of Internal Affairs;
• Visual check.

Let's consider each of the options in more detail.

Online request on the website of the Main Department of Migration Affairs of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (ex FMS)

Passport verification does not take much time, it is free and available to any citizen. The first and easiest way to verify the validity of your passport is to request the necessary information on the website of the Federal Migration Service - services.guvm.mvd.RF. It is the Main Directorate of Migration Affairs of the Ministry of Internal Affairs that issues and replaces passports and resolves migration and other issues. Just follow the link, enter the series, passport number and verification code. Access to the service is open to all users. After entering the data, the system will provide an answer almost immediately. The check is carried out using the database of invalid Russian passports. The system should report one of the answer options:

• Not found among invalid passports;
• Invalid (expired, withdrawn, destroyed);
• It is not listed in the GUVM database.

The last option does not mean that the passport is invalid, it means that information about the document has not yet entered the database.

When checking a passport on the website of the Main Directorate for Migration of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, you need to keep in mind that the analysis is carried out only on the database of invalid passports, that is, stolen, lost, issued with erroneous data, or those that have lost their validity. If a document is not listed in the database of invalid passports, this does not mean at all that it is valid. When falsifying a document, a fictitious series and number could be used. However, a Russian passport has a high degree of security, comparable to the security of banknotes, so it is rare that a document is forged from scratch; usually a ready-made form is used. This could be a stolen or lost passport. Since every citizen needs a document, theft or loss is usually promptly reported to law enforcement agencies, and after that the series and number end up in the database of invalid passports. One way or another, such a check does not provide an absolute guarantee and is for informational purposes only. This is worth considering.

Invalid passports of Russian citizens

The Main Directorate for Migration Affairs of the Ministry of Internal Affairs considers not only false passports invalid. There are several reasons why a document loses its validity:

• Expiration of the document (requires exchange at 20 and 45 years);
• Loss or theft (after application to the Main Department of Migration Affairs of the Ministry of Internal Affairs);
• Indication of erroneous data in the document;
• The presence in the document of entries that should not be there;
• Missing some pages;
• Visible damage;
• Inability to read information in a document;
• Change of personal data;
• Changing the appearance of the passport holder.

The document may also be declared invalid if, when acquiring Russian citizenship, a person provided false information and this was discovered after some time.

Personal request to the Main Department of Migration Affairs of the Ministry of Internal Affairs

The most reliable way to check your passport is to make an official application to the Main Migration Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.

To do this, a written request is drawn up, which is transmitted either during a personal visit or by mail. The procedure will take a lot of time - the standard processing time for requests of this kind is about a month. A verification method through direct contact with the government service will be needed in cases where it is necessary to obtain official, legally significant confirmation of the authenticity of the passport. The response to the request received from the Main Directorate for Migration Affairs of the Ministry of Internal Affairs already has legal status and completely determines the status of the passport.

Visual inspection of the passport

In addition to checking your passport on the website of the Main Directorate for Migration Affairs of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and personally contacting a government agency, you can make an assumption about the authenticity of the document yourself by visually inspecting it. To do this, you need a banknote detector (Ultramag type), which is usually found in commercial organizations that work with cash.

First, you can visually inspect the form; if it is too new or, on the contrary, too worn, which does not correspond to its date of issue, then this should alert you and in itself is a reason for further more detailed study of the document. It makes sense to pay attention to the dates of birth and registration at the place of residence, whether they correspond to the age of the document bearer.

A passport is a document that is sufficiently protected from forgery. Attackers rarely falsify the entire form; most often they limit themselves to only partial changes. What does this mean?

1. Replacing a photo. Criminals re-paste photos in stolen or lost passports. To do this, the book block is embroidered and the sheet is completely replaced, or the lamination is removed and a new photo is pasted in. Upon careful inspection, a counterfeit page will differ from the original; traces of glue, deformation and other damage will be visible.
2. Partial replacement of pages. Perhaps the attackers will choose a simpler, but crude method of forgery and simply replace some pages from one passport with others taken from the real form. Such a counterfeit is easy to detect: you need to compare the series and number on each page of the passport, they will be different.

Protective elements

This document contains many security elements, some can be seen visually, others will require a special device. Let's name only the main ones:

• Three-tone watermarks “RF” on each page are visible if you hold the book block of the passport up to the light;
• Hidden words “Passport”, “Russia”, “Place of residence”, “Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia”, which can be detected using UV radiation;
• Protective fibers - red ones are visible in normal daylight, green and yellow ones are visible in UV radiation;
• Printing protection - metallographic printing is used, the relief of which is checked by touch;
• A brown stripe on the last page with a special ornament and a hidden image “Russia” - can be seen when the form is tilted;
• Laser micro-perforation on every page;
• Protective laminated film;
• Infrared protection.

When checking, any smudged ink or unclear writing should alert you. The only page where you can enter information by hand is the place of registration.

Video: additional points on visual passport verification

Foreign passports

On the website of the Main Directorate for Migration Affairs of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, you can check foreign passports, but only of the old type, issued for 5 years. To check new generation biometric documents, you need to contact the Migration Service in person.

A foreign passport usually ceases to be valid after its expiration date, which is indicated on the first page. But this does not mean that its owner will be able to travel abroad until this date. As a rule, visa requirements of most countries in the world require that a foreign visitor's passport will have some “reserve”, usually from 1 to 6 months. It all depends on the state where you are planning to travel. For example, to obtain such a “reserve” must be at least 3 months, to obtain a visa to the UK and the USA - 6 months.

How to check the passport of a CIS citizen?

It will not be possible to check the authenticity of a foreign citizen’s passport at the Russian Main Migration Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. This service does not have such data. However, you can still find out some information. If a foreigner is in Russia on legal grounds and has a patent or work permit, temporary residence permit or residence permit, then the accuracy of these documents can be checked on the web resource of the Main Directorate for Migration Affairs of the Ministry of Internal Affairs - services.guvm.mvd.rf. Information on the availability of a migrant’s passport in the so-called is also available there.

This site also provides the ability to check an entry ban for a foreigner arriving from the CIS countries or other countries. The information will be useful not only for those wishing to come to the Russian Federation, but also for employers hiring foreigners.

A passport can be included in the “black list” of the Main Directorate for Migration Affairs of the Ministry of Internal Affairs for a number of reasons:

• Residence in Russia beyond the permitted period;
• Violation ;
• Committing two or more administrative offenses during the year;
• Violation of customs rules;
• Unpaid fines, alimony, utility bills, loans;
• during a previous visit to the Russian Federation.

To check whether a foreigner’s passport is on the “black list”, you must provide personal information and passport details. After entering the verification code and clicking the “Submit” button, the system will provide information about whether an entry ban has been established or not.