The world at large does a much better job of verifying and policing pilot logbooks than the US, but years ago one of the defining points early in one's career was to have obtained the ATP written release, in the USA. This was a FAA release that authorized the holder to go take the written exam. The reason it had some significance then was that the FAA audited the logbook before issuing the authorization, including calling owners or operators of aircraft in the book to verify specific flights at random.
I've done government checkrides that involved over three hours of logbook scrutiny. Today, however, in the US, very few every get their logbooks looked over. For the most part, the majority of the pilots I know are honerable and don't falsify their logs, but I've known a few who have.
I had an assistant chief pilot years ago who was a smooth talker, but whom I suspected had falsified much of his experience. Imagine my surprise when I happened to be across town one day, and wandered into a FBO. There on the wall was a list of students who had graduated, with a picture of him, missing his shirt tail...a year or so before. He had zero experience, he'd lied about everything.
Recently I worked with an individual whom I was sure had falsified his experience. He was inept, knew so little I suspected he'd either been a very poor student pilot or still was one, and here he was going through screening for a job. He claimed airline experience, he claimed flight instruction experience, and claimed to have instructed for some fairly prestigious names CAE Simuflight, Flight Safety International, etc). After some checking, we soon learned he'd not flown for the airline or the instruction facilities; he'd lied about everything. It showed in his speech, his knowledge, and his flying.
I think in both those cases, the best thing that could have happened to them was an audit such as the CASA system going on now. It would have helped many others who could have potentially been influenced or put at risk by those individuals. I certainly wish the FAA had a similiar practice, in the United States.