Starting Friday, all new driving licences issued across the EU will be in the form of a plastic "credit card," with a standard European format and tougher security protection.

The new driving licence directive which takes effect tomorrow mandates that all new licences must follow a common format – credit-card-sized plastic licences which expire every 10-15 years.

The new European licence will progressively replace the more than 100 different paper and plastic models currently in use by more than 300 million drivers across the EU.

Existing licences are not affected, but will be changed to the new format at the time of renewal or at the latest by 2033. The European driving licence can be adapted to incorporate national symbols as decided by each member state.

The new driving licence includes a number of security features to make it "tamper proof" and to avoid falsification.

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