He said most state agencies had a strict background checking system for job candidates and people found using fake certificates and degrees would be charged with forgery.

Chaipruek’s commented following Sunday’s arrest of two groups of suspects for allegedly selling fake diplomas and other educational certificates on social media.

“The buying and selling of fake educational papers exists,” Chaipruek said. “The fake certificates cite credentials from the Office of Basic Education Commission, the Office of the Non-Formal and Informal Education (NFE) and the Office of Vocational Education Commission. Hence, prospective employers must do thorough background checks.”

Office of Higher Education Commission chief Supat Champathong thanked police for arresting those allegedly selling fake credentials and urged officers to extend the net to nab more groups and to notify the universities whose names are used in fake papers so they can file police complaints.

Supat said he believed university people were not involved in this illegal trade as most institutes had good student registration systems that prevented easy access to abusing information.

He also urged employers to directly verify job candidates’ credentials with universities – a process which took less than a month.

On Sunday, city police chief Lt-General Sanit Mahathavorn presented the four suspects charged with conspiring to falsify education certificates for sale on the Internet along with seized evidence including 18 fake education certificates, 19 stamps of schools and universities, and bank account books they allegedly used to receive payments from customers.

Kittiwat Charnwimonrat, 23, and Juthawadee Sirisuksawat, 21, were nabbed in Surin province while two other suspects from a separate group, Weerapol Khamsaeng, 25, and Lalita Kaewboonreung, 22, were nabbed in Ubon Ratchathani province.

Metropolitan Police Area 2 police investigators probed the selling of fake credentials on social media and secured court-issued arrest warrants, working with local police to arrest them.

Kittiwat allegedly admitted that he studied how to falsify the documents online and hired rubber stamp-making shops to produce the university and school seals for document falsifying.

He allegedly said he sold the fake documents online for between Bt3,500 and Bt9,800 apiece, with most customers ordering Mathayom 3, Mathayom 6 and the NFE’s Kor Sor Nor certificates.

He allegedly said he got up to 20 orders a month and had been selling the fake documents for two years, with some 600 customers in total.