The Crime of Document Forgery and Its Impact on Threatening Public Trust A Scientific Article by Assistant Lecturer Fatima Makki

17/06/2026   Share :        
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The crime of document forgery is considered one of the serious crimes that affects public trust and directly influences the stability of legal and financial transactions within society. Documents and legal instruments, whether official, private, or electronic, represent an important means of proving rights and obligations between individuals and institutions. Therefore, any alteration of their truth or manipulation of their content may result in serious harm to individuals, official bodies, and the economy in general. Document forgery refers to changing the truth in a document or legal instrument through unlawful means, with the intention of using it as if it were genuine, in a way that may cause harm to others. This change may occur through creating an entirely forged document, imitating signatures or seals, adding false information, deleting essential details, or modifying the content of the document in a manner contrary to the truth. The crime of document forgery is based on several essential elements. The most important of these is the material element, which is represented by the act that leads to changing the truth in the document. As for the moral element, it is represented by criminal intent, meaning that the offender is aware that the document is false and intends to use it or enable others to use it in order to obtain an unlawful benefit. It is also required that the forgery be capable of causing harm, whether this harm is material, moral, or social, and whether it has actually occurred or is likely to occur. The documents that may be subject to forgery vary according to their legal nature. There are official documents issued by governmental authorities or prepared by a competent public employee in accordance with the law. There are also private documents created by individuals among themselves to prove obligations or rights. In addition, electronic documents have become an important part of modern transactions as a result of technological development and digital transformation. The consequences of document forgery are serious. It may lead to the loss of individuals’ financial and legal rights, undermine confidence in official documents, harm economic stability, increase legal disputes, and burden justice institutions with cases that could have been avoided if more effective verification and protection methods were available. To reduce this crime, it is necessary to adopt modern methods for verifying the authenticity of documents, use advanced protection and electronic authentication technologies, impose stricter legal penalties on those who commit forgery crimes, spread legal awareness among citizens, and train specialized employees to detect forged documents and deal with them according to legal procedures. In conclusion, the crime of document forgery represents a clear attack on public trust and on the legal rights of individuals and institutions. With the rapid development of paper-based and electronic transactions, there is an urgent need to develop protection and monitoring systems and strengthen legal awareness, in a way that contributes to protecting legal and financial transactions and achieving stability within society. Al-Mustaqbal University… The First University in Iraq.