A group of Republican Senators led by Mike Crapo of Idaho sent the Internal Revenue Service a letter. express concern about the agency’s partnership with the facial recognition service ID.me. Starting this summer, taxpayers will have to sign up for an ID.me account to be able to access the online services the IRS offers, including the ability to file through their website. To be able to apply, they must send ID.me a copy of their government ID, utility bill and a selfie video of themselves. The Senators called the last item “the most intrusive verification item,” because it’s more than simply sending a photo of a person’s face and isn’t as easily replaceable as a password.
In the letter, the group said it was “deeply concerned for a number of reasons,” starting with the government’s “unfortunate history of data breaches.” It mentioned attacks on the Office of Personnel Management in 2015 as an example. If you recall, two separate attacks on agency damaged information on millions of current and former federal employees and leads to steal out of 21.5 million Social Security Numbers.
The group also cites an IRS report in 2019, which estimated that they face 1.4 billion cyberattacks each year. “Most likely, given the personal information of 70 million individuals reported, including biometric data, ID.me could be a prime target for cybercriminals, fraudsters and spies.” , the senator wrote. They asked the agency a series of questions to shed light on the partnership in the letter. The senators wanted to know if the IRS does due diligence to ensure taxpayer information is protected before approving the partnership and what kind of oversight the agency has over the company. . they also asked the IRS if they would ensure ID.me’s systems had gone through an independent cybersecurity audit, among other things.
Recently ID.me CEO admit that the system uses a more powerful facial recognition method than previously claimed. In a statement, he said ID.me uses a 1: many approach, which means it matches images with images in the database. Previously, he said it only used the 1:1 method to compare a person’s face with a photo on their government ID. ONE Bloomberg The report was subsequently published stating that the Treasury Department review IRS partnership with the company and is currently looking for alternatives to its facial recognition software.
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