Section 269/11: Unlawful use of another person's passport
Statutory text (Thai original)
ผู้ใดใช้หนังสือเดินทางของผู้อื่นโดยมิชอบ ในประการที่น่าจะก่อให้เกิดความเสียหายแก่ผู้อื่นหรือประชาชน ต้องระวางโทษจำคุกไม่เกินสิบปี และปรับไม่เกินสองแสนบาท ผู้ใดจัดหาหนังสือเดินทางให้ผู้กระทำความผิดตามวรรคหนึ่ง ต้องระวางโทษเช่นเดียวกัน
English translation
Whoever unlawfully uses the passport of another person, in a manner likely to cause damage to another person or to the public, shall be liable to imprisonment not exceeding ten years and a fine not exceeding two hundred thousand baht.
Whoever procures a passport for a person who commits an offence under paragraph one shall be liable to the same penalty.
ThaiLawOnline translation, written from the Thai original and verified
Firm annotation
Section 269/11 is the passport analogue of Section 269/5: the document is genuine but the user has no right to use it. Its elements are using the passport of another person, unlawfully, in a manner likely to cause damage to another person or to the public. Nothing need be forged or altered; presenting a genuine passport belonging to someone else is the whole offence. Paragraph two is significant and has no counterpart in the electronic card group: a person who procures the passport for the offender is liable to the same penalty as a principal, not merely as a supporter under Section 86. That reaches the agent, the family member, and the employer who supplies the booklet, and it does so without any need to prove they took part in the use itself. The penalty structure differs from most of the Chapter in that it is cumulative, imprisonment and a fine, but with a maximum only and no minimum, so a suspended sentence remains available in a suitable case.
Why this matters in practice
This is the provision most likely to catch an otherwise law abiding person, because it requires no forgery at all. Presenting a sibling's or a friend's passport to board a flight, to check into a hotel, or to satisfy an immigration officer is a ten year offence, and the fact that the passport is entirely genuine is no answer. Paragraph two should be read carefully by anyone who holds another person's passport, including employers who retain staff passports, because handing it over for use by someone else carries the same ten year exposure as using it. Employers should also note that retaining an employee's passport raises separate issues under labour and anti trafficking law. Where the use is to enter or remain in Thailand, Immigration Act charges are laid alongside.
Cited in 1 Supreme Court decisions (2021 to 2021)
Selected citing decisions
- Decision 1105/2564 (2021)
This list is selected automatically, weighted towards judgments that turn on this section rather than ones that merely recite it when passing sentence. It has not yet been reviewed by the firm.
Counted across the firm's corpus of 83,652 Supreme Court decisions, 1921 to 2026. The count is complete; the stated year range trims rare outliers so it describes where the citations actually sit. These figures are computed by us and are not official court statistics. How we count these, and what we measured
Cite this section
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Plain citation
Penal Code, s. 269/11 (Thailand) -
Academic citation
Penal Code (Thailand), s. 269/11. ThaiLawOnline, https://www.thailawonline.com/thai-penal-code/section-269-11/ (accessed 8 August 2026). -
Thai citation
ป.อ. มาตรา 269/11 -
Permalink
https://www.thailawonline.com/thai-penal-code/section-269-11/ -
Embed on your site
<blockquote cite="https://www.thailawonline.com/thai-penal-code/section-269-11/"><p>Whoever unlawfully uses the passport of another person, in a manner likely to cause damage to another person or to the public, shall be liable to imprisonment not exceeding ten years and a fine not exceeding two hundred thousand baht. Whoever procures a passport for…</p><footer>Penal Code, s. 269/11 (Thailand) — <a href="https://www.thailawonline.com/thai-penal-code/section-269-11/">ThaiLawOnline</a></footer></blockquote>
The Thai text is authoritative. The English is an unofficial translation by ThaiLawOnline, free to reuse with attribution.