New technology such as chip and pin or the government’s ID cards could increase rather than solve the problem of identity theft and fraud, a criminologist has warned.

Researchers have concluded that the shift from human vigilance to a reliance on new technologies is failing to prevent the activities of fraudsters and in some cases is providing them with new opportunities.

Criminologist Dr Emily Finch of the University of East Anglia, who interviews career criminals about their activities, is convinced that criminals will find ways around the proposed security measures designed to ensure that those applying for identity cards are who they say they are.

"Studying the way that individuals disclose sensitive information would be far more valuable in preventing identity fraud than the evolution of technologically advanced but ultimately fallible measures to prevent misuse of personal information after it has been obtained," she said.

"What fraudsters know about is human nature. They know about people, they know how we operate, and they know how relationships of trust in which information is disclosed develop," Dr Finch told reporters in Dublin, where she is to speak at the British Association Science Festival this week.

"There is a worrying assumption that advances in technology will provide the solution to identity theft whereas it is possible that they may actually aggravate the problem," she said.

Dependence on technology was leading to a breakdown in individual vigilance, which experts believe is one of the best ways to prevent fraud and identity theft. People had to start thinking about how they handled sensitive information about themselves and how they disclosed it to others, argued the Criminologist. "The more people rely on the production of a particular piece of identification to verify identity, the less vigilance people will exercise themselves - that's the problem," said Dr Finch.

To demonstrate the lack of vigilance, she said that she and a male research colleague had used each other's credit cards for a long period without being challenged on the grounds that a woman was using a card with a male name or vice versa.