New rules will mean that people applying for passports will be obliged to attend a compulsory 20 minute interview to prove their identity in order to receive a passport and travel abroad.

From May 2007 new applicants will have to answer up to 200 questions about their personal and financial history and each application will be checked against a personal dossier drawn from Government databases.

Half of all new passport applicants are aged between 16 and 19. The interviews will take place in locations up to 20 miles from applicants’ homes.

The Home Office estimates that as many as 10,000 passports issued by mail each year have been posted to fraudulent applicants.

The questions will be drawn from 200 stock queries and cover family history, recent addresses, financial background, mortgage data, credit references and the background of the person counter-signing the passport application.

The new proposals have been criticised by opponents of plans to introduce biometric ID cards and passports, as they are concerned that the collected personal data could be misused. The Home Office has pledged that the information gained during the interviews will be destroyed after passports are issued.

There are also concerns that individuals living in rural areas will have difficulties travelling to the interviews.

From 2009, fingerprints will also be taken from all new passport applicants.