Fake Green Passes Sold for as Much as 500 Euros: 4 Under Investigation, 2 Are Minors

Fake green passes sold online at a price between 150 and the 500 euro: 4 suspects including two minors in the Fake Pass operation carried out today by the postal police who also closed 32 Telegram channels used for sales.

As part of a complex investigative activity – called operation Fake Pass – carried out by Postal and Communications Police Service, in agreement with the Departments of Milan and Bari, with the coordination of the Public Prosecutor's Offices at the Courts of Rome, Milan and minors from Bari, 4 individuals were identified, searched and investigated, including 2 minors, managers of various Telegram channels specialized in the illegal offer of fake Green Pass Covid-19 Certificates, for the crimes of fraud and forgery.

The investigations were triggered by a thorough monitoring of the Internet, through which the specialists of the Postal Police, through complex technical and financial analyses of the block chain, the technology underlying cryptocurrencies, were able to identify the sales channels and identify their administrators. There were thousands of users registered to the channels on well-known communication platforms where the sale of cryptocurrencies was proposed, with an absolute guarantee of anonymity. fake green passes, to be paid in cryptocurrency or vouchers from platforms for the online shopping, at a price between 150 and 500 euros.

A total of thirty-two Telegram channels were seized by Postal Police officers during the investigation in execution of the preventive seizure decree issued by the Judge for Preliminary Investigations of the Court of Rome at the request of the Capitoline Prosecutor's Office, thus allowing the interruption of the criminal activity.

The investigative activity, still in progress, is aimed at identifying the administrators of further channels identified as well as the buyers. Police remember and “any original Green Pass certificate cannot be falsified or tampered with since each certification is produced digitally with a private key from the Ministry of Health which ensures its authenticity. At each check with the official VerificaC19 App, the ministerial database containing the official list of the vaccinated population is queried and, consequently, a QR-CODE generated with a non-authentic certification would not pass the verification procedure”.