An investigation by the Daily Mail has revealed significant flaws in Britain’s number plate system, uncovering that official suppliers are distributing plates that evade detection by road cameras.

Officials have raised the alarm over a lax car registration framework that is being misused by thousands of criminal elements and careless drivers nationwide. The system’s lack of regulation has led to concerns about its exploitation.

It is estimated that approximately one in 15 vehicles might be equipped with “ghost plates,” specifically designed to avoid detection by automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) cameras.

The surge in the use of these plates has sparked serious national security concerns, as they could potentially provide a loophole for terrorists and have reportedly been used by grooming gangs to evade law enforcement.

In a troubling discovery, one of our reporters was able to purchase a set of ghost plates from a supplier registered with the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA). The transaction went through without any verification of ownership, highlighting the ease of acquiring such plates.

The plates in question featured 4D raised lettering, a design that experts claim poses significant challenges for road cameras in terms of readability, rendering them nearly invisible to surveillance systems.

But researchers from Cranfield University found another layer of stealth when they tested the Mail’s plates in a specialist lab, with all but one character made of transparent material.

Startling images showed the plates appear blank apart from a single letter when photographed in anything other than dazzling daylight.

The ‘true ghost plates’ obtained by the Mail were almost entirely invisible when photographed under infrared light, which is used by road cameras at night or in low visibility

The plate also appeared mainly blank when photographed in partial lighting – due to transparent material being used on six of the seven letters 

It was only when photographed in dazzling daylight that the other characters on the number plates could be seen at all 

The ghost plates had so-called 4D lettering with characters raised off the flat surface, which can confuse road cameras by creating shadows and distortions

Daily Mail reporter Jack Hardy was able to obtain the ghost plates through an official DVLA-registered supplier, without any checks being carried out

Dr Stuart Barnes, who analysed the plates for the Mail, said: ‘These are true ghost plates that use a special material intended to be invisible to most ANPR cameras operating at night.

‘To the naked eye, the characters look the same as on any other number plate, so it’s difficult to identify ghost plates just by looking at them.

‘You can only see the difference when you view them through an ANPR-type camera.’

This would make them illegal to use on the roads, despite our reporter obtaining them through a supplier listed on the national register and the plates bearing full road-legal markings.

A second set of 4D plates bought by the Mail from a separate supplier – again without any checks – were found to have thinned characters ‘which could potentially confuse an ANPR camera’ when photographed, according to the academics.

Both suppliers are now facing investigation by the DVLA following a tip-off from the Mail.

The Government is being urged to tighten up the law to explicitly ban plates using so-called 3D and 4D characters, which, because of a strange loophole, are not currently illegal to sell.

Sarah Coombes MP, who has been campaigning for tougher penalties for ghost plates, said: ‘This Daily Mail investigation shows just how broken the UK’s number plate system is.

‘It’s far too easy to buy dodgy illegal plates and criminals and dangerous car racers are using them every day to evade the law.

‘This number plate wild west is great for criminals and terrible for the rest of us.

‘We urgently need stricter penalties for those caught with ghost plates and much tighter controls and background checks on the people selling number plates in the first place.’

Separate plates bought by the Mail  had thinned characters ‘which could potentially confuse an ANPR camera’ when photographed under infrared – with the ‘G’ here already looking like a ‘C’

Both sets of 4D number plates were dispatched within days by two separate suppliers, despite no checks being carried out to verify car ownership

The plates ordered by our reporter used the fictitious registration ‘DM17 GTZ’, which includes letters from the acronym of the Mail’s parent group, the Daily Mail and General Trust (DMGT)

The ease with which the Mail was able to obtain illegal number plates from an official supplier exposes several serious flaws in how Britain regulates its roads.

Almost uniquely in the West, Britain allows anyone to become an official number plate supplier by paying a one-off fee of just £40, without any kind of criminal background check.

A recent report from MPs revealed there are now an ‘eye-watering’ 34,455 suppliers – four times the number of petrol stations in the UK – and the system was ‘wide open to abuse’.

Convicted fraudsters and criminals linked to ‘to murder, firearms, drugs, robbery and violent assault’ have been found among the authorised suppliers by trading standards investigators.

Against this backdrop sits a system with virtually no rule enforcement.

The DVLA only employs ‘five or six’ staff to audit the rapidly expanding number of number plate sellers, leading to warnings the market is ‘largely unregulated’.

When the Mail began its own investigation, the sheer brazenness with which some companies advertised their products as ‘ghost plates’ indicated how little they feared being caught.

With just a few clicks, an order was placed and the plates soon arrived in the post, despite no checks being made by the seller.

Failing to verify car ownership can have serious consequences, as it allows criminals to clone number plates for cars they do not own and rack up fines for innocent motorists.

The plates ordered by our reporter used the fictitious registration ‘DM17 GTZ’, which includes letters from the acronym of the Mail’s parent group, the Daily Mail and General Trust (DMGT).

The suppliers appeared not to notice the possible link between the number plates and the Daily Mail – despite the shipping address being our London newsroom.

It was expected the plates would likely be invisible to cameras simply because the raised characters create shadows that can make them hard to distinguish.

But when one set were tested at Cranfield University, it became clear the characters were not the only thing capable of frustrating road cameras.

Six of the seven letters were made from material that became transparent under infrared light, which ANPR relies on at night or in low visibility.

‘The characters fully disappear under infrared illumination,’ Dr Barnes said.

Although the supplier did not advertise this openly – saying they were simply 4D plates – it appears they knew how the product would likely be used and constructed accordingly.

The surging popularity of ghost plates is already causing a headache for police, with MPs finding they are now being used by grooming gangs and organised crime syndicates.

The Met Police are increasingly concerned terrorists could exploit what they called ‘a critical vulnerability for national security’.

But critics warn ordinary motorists also have an ‘incentive’ to obtain ghost plates due to controversial green policies like London’s camera-enforced Ulez zone.

A report by the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Transport Safety called for an ‘overhaul’ of the registration plate sale system, including a ban on 4D and 3D number plates.

A spokesman for the DVLA said: ‘There are strict laws in place which demand number plate suppliers are properly registered with DVLA, and robust identification standards for buyers.

‘DVLA works with police and Trading Standards to enforce these strict rules, and we will investigate any reports of suppliers failing to comply with the law.

‘On top of this, there is a review on the current standards on number plates which aims to ban production of plates that are specifically designed to evade Automatic Number Plate recognition cameras.’