How to Check IDs in Protect the Border

The official pitch starts with two words: ID and face. That is not decoration. Protect the Border pays you for catching a mismatch before you ever pop a trunk. Officers who reverse the order — cargo first, papers later — leak both cash and time, then arrive at night already tired.

This guide is the how-to-find page for a bad document. Pair it with Getting Started if you still fumble the HUD, and with how to search trunks only after the face is settled.

The three-second stare

When a vehicle stops:

1. Take the ID.
2. Look at the portrait, then the driver, then the portrait again.
3. Check the name and any extra field the BETA currently shows (expiration, city, or serial — the live build still iterates).
4. Only then walk to the rear of the vehicle.

If step 2 fails, you do not need a perfect cargo search to justify a stop. Move to suspect processing. A forged face with a clean trunk is still a forged face.

What “match the face” actually means

A match is not “same hair color, close enough.” Look for:

• Hairline and facial hair that the portrait does not have
• Glasses, scars, or a mask that the card never printed
• A completely different head on a reused name
• A driver who will not look at you while you hold the card

The BETA is a simulation, not a courtroom. If the game highlights a mismatch, believe the highlight. If it does not highlight and your eyes still disagree, treat it as a stop and search. False confidence is how illegal goods ride in the back of a “friendly” car.

Speed versus accuracy

Queues punish slow officers, but Endless Mode punishes sloppy ones more. A missed forgery is a free enemy later. A slightly slower booth with four people who all stare at faces will outlast a speed-runner who stamps everything.

On mobile, zoom before you compare. The controls page covers pinch and camera issues. On console, take an extra second; stick cameras lie at night.

Party roles at the window

With two or more officers:

• One person owns the window and the ID
• One person waits at the trunk and does not open it until the window calls clear or stop
• A third watches the road if you are near sunset
• A fourth rests magazines or covers the cell

Talk in short calls: “face good,” “face bad,” “open it.” Long stories in voice chat are how a second car creeps up during a raid warning. The inspection checklist uses the same calls.

When the ID is fine and the driver is not

Some cars will pass the portrait and still feel wrong: too much cash on the seat, a driver who offers a bribe before you ask, a trunk that sits too low. That is a cargo problem. Do not invent an ID fail. Open the trunk with the search guide and let the goods decide.

Bribes that appear at the window are a processing decision, not an ID decision. Taking money to skip the stare is the fastest way to teach yourself a bad habit. Read how to process suspects if the envelope is already in the animation.

Tools that do not replace your eyes

The X-Ray Scanner pass is offsale. Even when it was sold, it read cargo, not faces. No current class removes the ID step. Juggernaut’s 250 HP will not catch a fake portrait. Ghillie Sniper’s SVD will not either. Classes change the night. They do not change the window.

After a clean match

Call “face good,” walk to the rear, and keep the ID in mind if the trunk is dirty. A legal face with illegal goods is still an arrest. A legal face with legal goods is the rare car you wave through so the queue does not explode.

If you want to see how this loop pays, open how to earn cash. Accurate faces are the cheapest gold in the BETA. They cost no Robux and they keep the night from starting with extra enemies you personally stamped through.

Close this tab only when you can fail a face on purpose in your head: portrait, driver, difference, cuff. Then search the next trunk like a second lock, not like the first.