Anyone wishing to hire a car at Stansted airport is now compelled to give a fingerprint before collecting their cars, and whilst it's not yet a prerequisite of car rental at London's two major airports - Gatwick and Heathrow - at the smaller Essex airport it is compulsory, under order of the police! All customers' fingerprints are collected as part of a new scheme between the hire companies and the Essex Constabulary - taken so that if the car is subsequently used in a crime or simply stolen then the fingerprints will be collected from the hire firms and the criminal tracked down.
The scheme has been introduced in an attempt to combat a rise in criminals targeting car hire firms at airports. The crooks have recently taken to presenting forged passports, credit cards and driving licences and then, once they have taken possession of the hire vehicle drive it away, never to be seen again. By taking customers' fingerprints the police believe the process will act either as a deterrent to the criminals, or as the first clue in tracking them down.
Waving off protests that taking fingerprints is excessive when simply hiring a car, Detective Sergeant Vic Murphy, based at the CID unit at Stansted airport said: "It's not really intrusive. It's different - and people will need to adjust. This isn't big brother, it's about protecting people's identities. These prints will never see the light of day unless a crime is committed." He insists that the extra checking is already reducing fraud, and at least one of the hire firms taking part in the pilot is said to be keen to roll out the scheme to the rest of its airport locations.
Despite the increase in biometric identification around the country - and this scheme in particular - there are no plans as yet to introduce compulsory fingerprinting for car hire at Gatwick Airport, or indeed at Heathrow, but if the scheme at Stansted significantly reduces crime or leads to more successful convictions, then it may well follow, however vociferous the complaints of the civil liberties groups.
