Microfiche containing millions of records of British births, marriages, and deaths have been stolen from libraries in Bristol and Bath. “So far we have counted 2,500 films missing, mainly from 1980 to 1995,” Bristol Local Studies Librarian Jane Bradley told the February 19 Bristol Evening Post, which reported that the documents, with a replacement cost of £20,000 (U.S. $31,726) disappeared about three months ago.
In Bath, 240 fiche were found to be missing from the Central Library during a recent inventory. The February 20 Bath Chronicle said the loss was not being linked to the Bristol theft.
The news reports noted that the thefts could be used by criminals to create false identities and raised fears that terrorists could use the information to enter the country using fake British passports. The Evening Post reminded readers that a professional assassin used the identity of a dead person to obtain a false passport in Frederick Forsyth’s novel The Day of the Jackal.
“Whoever has these files could be using them for fraud purposes to get hold of fake identities using an official copy of a birth or death certificate, or to fake an illegal marriage,” said Else Churchill of the Society of Genealogists. “It is possible that someone could assume the identity of a dead person.”
Posted February 24, 2003.