So there is not a way for Jo e Public to just call up an institution and ask if somebody graduated from there in a certain year?
Always wondered about this. A person I used to work for used to lie about his education, never went to college. Don't think any of the companies he went to work for ever bothered to check.
There used to be. Years ago I needed to verify a student's claim that he had a Master's degree and I simply called the registrar's office of the college and received a verbal confirmation. But now we have computers and "privacy" laws and lawyers and everything seems much more complicated.