(KMOV.com) -- St. Louis Police are keeping an eye out for a new scheme involving stolen cars and swapped tags.
Thieves copy the Vehicle Identification Number of a legally owned vehicle in a parking lot. The VIN is then used to create counterfeit tags. Those tags replace tags on stolen vehicles, essentially cloning a legal vehicle and covering the thieves’ tracks.
Officials say it leads to vehicles all over the country with the same VIN information, and puts unsuspecting car buyers on the hook.
