Vigilance vs. fake IDs, and the kids are crafty

In the months leading up to her first day of college, Ali, an English major at Boston College, purchased the usual goods -- bed linens, picture frames, posters, and pillows.

But that wasn't all she brought from her San Francisco Bay-area home. There was something else she decided she needed to get before moving to Boston: a fake ID.

''I got it at the end of high school in preparation for college," said Ali, who asked that her last name be withheld for fear of legal repercussions. She was 18 at the time, but she knew that drinking was part of campus culture, and didn't want to be left out of the fun.

Almost everything on her new ''license" was correct -- it listed her real name and home address, had her exact signature and photograph. The only thing missing was her real age. The ID said she was born in 1982, not 1984.

''I got it from a friend of a friend of a friend who knew a guy" who made them, she said. ''I later found out he was arrested for making fakes."

Her story is hardly unusual. Throughout the country -- and especially in a college town like Boston -- thousands of students like Ali illegally pose as 21 every year. Despite more sophisticated driver's license designs that are supposed to be harder to replicate, police, campus officials, and neighborhood cashiers are having a hard time curbing the trend.

''It's a major problem," said Daniel F. Pokaski, chairman of the Boston Licensing Bureau, which regulates alcohol licenses for city establishments. ''Computer technology out there is huge. Kids are doing this in their dorm rooms."

Improvements to the average home computer and printer have made it easy for students to become entrepreneurs, making fake IDs and selling them for as much as $80.

''That's the problem we're having," said Boston Police Captain William Evans. ''As the technology gets better, we have students who are in the business of making these fake IDs, and the technology makes them very hard to detect."

While it's impossible to put a number on how many Boston students have fake IDs, ''underage drinkers consumed 15.6 percent of all alcohol sold in Massachusetts" in 2001, according to the International Institute for Alcohol Awareness. The number of fake IDs collected a year is ''in the thousands," said Pokaski. Some bars and stores ''are more aggressive than others."

The popularity of the Internet has also put more fake IDs in underage hands. Typing in ''buy a fake ID" on Google, for example, results in 2,280,000 websites about fake IDs, whether words of caution from law enforcement or information on how to make them. Some sites advertise authentic-looking ''novelty IDs."

Evans, who commands Allston/Brighton's District 14, is perhaps the cop most familiar with these collegiate novelties. Over the past few years, he's worked closely with Boston University and Boston College to put an end to underage drinking and fake ID use.

The IDs ''are getting so good," he said. ''But every year we're confiscating a lot [more]. The liquor stores and the bars, for the most part, are very vigilant."

Using a fake ID is a felony in Massachusetts, carrying up to five years in jail, according to Evans. While not everyone faces full prosecution, students caught with one have their information forwarded to their university and the Registry of Motor Vehicles. (Because police don't classify liquor-related offenses by whether a fake ID is involved, no figures exist on the number of people arrested last year with fakes.)

Barbara Harrington, state executive director of Mothers Against Drunk Driving, said that the younger people are when they start to drink, whether by using fake IDs or any other means, the more likely they are to drive drunk, or develop an alcohol addiction. She said many liquor stores aren't tough enough.

As anyone walking into his store can see, Joe Gomes, manager of Blanchard Liquor, is tough on fake IDs. As his staff confiscates fakes, they get posted on the front door of the Allston shop.

''We confiscate the ID and we'll hold it here," he said. ''If they want it back, they have the option of calling law enforcement themselves, or we can call for them.

With students returning to the city in droves, this is the most popular time of the year for fake IDs, he said. On a typical weekend, his store catches five to 10.

There are a number of ways to check whether an ID is real.

Gomes's store has a machine that scans the barcode on a license to determine its authenticity. ''It's very efficient," he said. A typical scanner costs about $45.

The Cops-in-Shop program, which puts undercover officers in liquor stores to weed out fake IDs, has also been successful, according to Evans.

''When we see a young student who we believe is underage and they present an ID, we ask them what their name is and date of birth and check that," using police records, said Evans. ''If they're found using a fake ID, we'll lock them up."

While the technology available to students to make fake IDs has improved, the government is also doing a better job designing licenses with the addition of barcodes, holograms, and other unique information that makes them harder to replicate.

''It's getting there," Pokaski said of states' efforts, ''but I think that the technology that you can buy and bring home is also getting there."

There are simpler ways of finding fake IDs, though. Ali, the BC senior, used her ID without a problem throughout her freshman year in 2002. But as she started her sophomore year, something happened -- her ID, which usually scanned successfully right through the type of barcode device Gomes's store has, stopped working.

''The cashier scanned the ID and it made a weird beeping noise," she recalled. ''He asked for a backup ID, which in theory, I didn't have.

''So, I told him I had a credit card I could show him," she said. ''And as I opened my wallet, he saw my real license and said, 'Is that your other license?' "

She told him it was fake, left the alcohol on the counter, and walked out the door.