Virginia driver’s licenses now have a new look. For the first time in nearly a decade, the Department of Motor Vehicles has enhanced license security features, completely changing the cards’ design.
The licenses will be custom-made by a vendor in Danville, DMV spokesperson Melanie Stokes said, and have added security features compared to current cards, including two laser-engraved pictures, raised micro-lettering and hidden state symbols like a dogwood tree.
The new license program will become fully operational by the end of July, Stokes said. But because licenses will be replaced as they expire, both old and new licenses will be in circulation for a few years.
“A license is really much more than a permit to drive,” Stokes said. “It lets you open a bank account and get on a plane. We need licenses and ID cards to be unalterable and to have security features.”
These greater security features will help decrease the number of counterfeit cards, Stokes said. Some of these cards are in use by illegal immigrants, she added.
In 2000, the Immigration and Naturalization Service estimated that there were 103,000 illegal immigrants living in Virginia. By more recent counts, the number is much higher than that, with a 2007 estimate of 205,000 from the Federation for American Immigration Reform.
Even if some of those people will become American citizens in the future, they still need identification cards right now to find work, drive and check out books from the library, Stokes explained. The new cards will help lower the number of immigrants who have and can use illegally issued or counterfeit cards.
The decision to change the IDs was motivated mostly by immigration and security issues, but there were other factors as well, Stokes said. For instance, the changes will make it harder for minors to buy alcohol.
The DMV worked with grocery and bar managers across Virginia to make sure that businesses are aware of the changes, Stokes said, noting that the DMV sent out publications detailing the new security features and trained employees to detect counterfeits.
The cards will cut down on underage drinking because minors will have a hard time finding anyone with the capability to make counterfeit copies, Stokes said.
“It would take bad guys with more than a $100,000 worth of equipment to make fake copies of these [IDs],” Stokes said.
The new security features might make it more difficult for future students to obtain counterfeit licenses, but at least one current University student said he doubts current students will be affected by the changes.
First-year College student Anand Ramanathan said he has friends who have fake IDs right now, and noted that they are not worried.
“It’s going to be a while before all the old IDs expire,” Ramanathan said. “Most [current] students will be 21 by that time anyways, so they don’t really have anything to be worried about.”
The DMV also has a new method of issuing cards, Stokes said. Instead of waiting for licenses to be printed at a local DMV office, drivers will receive their cards in the mail. The DMV will issue temporary licenses that drivers can use until their permanent cards are sent.
This process will work similarly to the process for renewing a driver’s license or ID card online, DMV Commissioner D.B. Smit said. Almost 250,000 Virginians received their licenses in the mail last year, Smit added.
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