Shoppers will be asked to give their thumbprint when they pay by cheque or credit card as part of an anti-fraud campaign.

Keighley is the first police division in West Yorkshire to adopt the pioneering security measure - which has proved a success in the US.

Customers are asked to provide a thumbprint on the back of cheques or credit card slips.

Thumbprints from normal transactions will not be kept on a database, but in cases of fraud police will be able to recover the slip as evidence and use it to track down the criminal. Shops and petrol stations in Keighley town centre, Haworth, Silsden and Ilkley, will receive an inkless printing pad as part of a special 'Thumbs Up' security kit.

PC Steven Littlewood explained: "Criminals can forge someone's signature, but thumbprints are unique. This method has been used in parts of America with great success. The majority of people have been only too willing to provide a print.

"If you haven't got anything to hide there's nothing to worry about. But if someone is planning to use a stolen chequebook or credit card the thought of giving a print should deter them."

The kits also contain a counterfeit currency pen, which can be used to identify forged bank notes, and an ultra-violet lamp to test credit cards.

Keighley is the first area in the country to hand out all three security measures as one anti-fraud package. About 150 Thumbs Up kits will be handed out in the run-up to Christmas.

Police are leading the initiative with help of funding from the Keighley Single Regeneration Board, Bradford Council and Keighley Area Panel.

Roxana Clarkson, deputy manageress of Keighley fashion store Etam, says the equipment will help combat fraud over Christmas, but admits the inkless pad will have to be voluntary.

A spokesman for human rights group, Liberty, said: "As long as the thumbprints from legal transactions are destroyed and not stored on any database we would not take issue with this scheme."