# Detect tampered and deepfake Biometric Residence Permit (BRP) > A biometric residence permit (BRP) was the UK Home Office's credit-card-sized proof of immigration permission, carrying the holder's photograph, conditions of stay, and a three-line machine-readable zone, and it anchored right-to-work and right-to-rent checks for a decade. Physical cards retired on 31 December 2024 in favour of eVisa status, so BRPs now arrive as legacy evidence, and fraud still surfaces in remarks-column edits and retyped MRZ lines on cards already issued. **Canonical URL:** https://tampercheck.ai/documents-support/brp **API document class:** `brp` --- ## What a genuine biometric residence permit contains The front shows the holder's name, date of birth, nationality, and photograph, plus the card's validity window; the reverse carries the three 30-character MRZ lines with their check digits and the remarks column stating the duration and limits of leave, which is the text right-to-work decisions actually rest on. Under the post-2021 issuing rules every BRP printed with an expiry of 31 December 2024, the date the format retired in favour of the eVisa share-code system, while earlier prints expire within their grant. An expired card is not automatically fraudulent, since holders transitioned to eVisa rather than receiving replacements, so the forensic question is whether the card's printed claims cohere with itself and with the case. ## How biometric residence permit forgeries are made ### MRZ check digits The TD1 layout runs three 30-character lines whose check digits cover the document number, dates, and optional-data composites. Any validator failure means the zone was retyped, which is the standard route for reprinting an edited card. ### Remarks-column edits The remarks text is the fraud target: adding Indefinite Leave to Remain, stretching the leave end date, or deleting work restrictions. A font pass or spacing change inside one printed column localises the substitution. ### Expiry plausibility Cards printed under the post-2021 rules expire on 31 December 2024, and earlier prints expire within their granted leave. An expiry that outlives the stated grant, or postdates the retirement of the format, is internally inconsistent. ### Printed-versus-encoded agreement The card number and dates printed on the front must match their MRZ encoding on the reverse. Disagreement between two renderings of one field means the card was rebuilt rather than issued. ### Legacy context With eVisa status replacing cards, an expired BRP is normal evidence of a historical grant. The analysis weighs the card's internal coherence rather than penalising the format for being retired. ## What TamperCheck checks on a biometric residence permit TamperCheck runs 200+ forensic checks across three layers and returns a risk score from 0 to 100 with plain-English findings tied to specific regions of the document. These three carry the most weight on this document class. ### Machine-readable zone validation Check digits across every MRZ field are recomputed, and the encoded name, number, and dates are compared against the values printed on the face of the document. Forgers routinely update one and forget the other. ### Portrait substitution and face-swap analysis The document is isolated from whatever it was photographed on, then the portrait region is assessed against the card surface around it. A pasted or generated face rarely matches the substrate it was placed onto. ### Security print, foil, and hologram analysis A genuine security overlay or guilloche background behaves differently from a printed picture of one. A reproduction loses the structure that made the feature a security feature in the first place, and that loss is measurable even when the copy looks convincing on screen. ### And many more checks The three above are the layers that carry the most weight on a biometric residence permit. Every upload runs the full suite of 200+ checks regardless of document class, spanning file structure and metadata, pixel-level forensics, font and text rendering, optical and print characteristics, provenance signals, AI-generation signatures, and many more checks. ## Who verifies a biometric residence permit, and why UK employers running right-to-work checks, landlords, banks, and letting agents. In each case the document is being used to unlock money, access, or a legal status, which is exactly what makes it worth forging. ## How to verify a biometric residence permit in 4 steps 1. **Photograph both sides.** Capture the card flat, front and back, at full resolution with glare kept off the MRZ, since the encoded lines carry the check digits the analysis validates. 2. **Validate the MRZ.** Check the three lines' structure and check digits. A validator failure on any field means the zone was retyped rather than issued by the Home Office. 3. **Read the remarks.** Compare the remarks column against the leave period implied by the dates elsewhere on the card, and look for a font or spacing change inside the column. 4. **Run a forensic check on the file.** Remarks and MRZ edits are precise, small-region work that survives eyeballing. TamperCheck runs 200+ forensic checks including MRZ validation and remarks-column analysis, and returns a risk score from 0 to 100 with findings tied to specific regions of the image. ## Frequently asked questions ### Are BRPs still valid now that eVisas exist? Physical cards retired on 31 December 2024, and immigration status now lives in the Home Office's eVisa system behind share codes. An expired BRP remains evidence of a historical grant, while a card claiming a live future expiry contradicts the issuing rules and deserves scrutiny. ### What sits in the remarks column of a BRP? The conditions of stay: the length of leave, any work restrictions, and study conditions. Because right-to-work decisions rest on that text, it is the single most edited region of the card, and a font or spacing change inside the column is the tell. ### Does TamperCheck read the BRP's MRZ? Yes. TamperCheck validates the three-line MRZ check digits against the printed fields, then weighs the remarks column and expiry against the card's own dates, returning a risk score from 0 to 100 with findings tied to specific regions. ### Why would an employer still be shown a BRP? Cards issued under grants made before the transition remain in people's possession as legacy documents, and some verifiers accept them alongside share codes for history. The practical question is whether the card's printed claims cohere with the case, not whether the format is current. ## Related document types - TamperCheck Forensic Report: https://tampercheck.ai/documents-support/forensic_analysis_report - Unknown: https://tampercheck.ai/documents-support/unknown --- Try TamperCheck now: https://tampercheck.ai/dashboard · Docs: https://tampercheck.ai/docs · Pricing: https://tampercheck.ai/pricing