Nationwide E-Verify an Unwelcome Step Towards a National ID

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley recently reintroduced an E-Verify bill that ought to concern privacy advocates. If enacted, the bill would implement the employment verification scheme nationwide, something President Trump called for during his campaign. Nationwide E-Verify would establish the framework for a national ID system that would undoubtedly come to be used for more than the enforcement of immigration laws.

E-Verify allows employers to check a new hire’s information against government databases to confirm legal status. It is an ineffective system. One reason why E-Verify suffers from inefficiency is because, as things stand, employers taking part in E-Verify use information from documents such as Social Security cards provided by employees. Because the E-Verify system matches employees’ names with a Social Security Number (SSN) it’s possible for an unauthorized worker using a fraudulent SSN to be cleared for employment. A 2009 audit commissioned by the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services estimated that 54 percent of unauthorized workers who submitted documents via E-Verify were erroneously cleared for employment thanks to fraud.

 

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