Homeland Security » Allegiant Solutions

GAO: E-Verify Can’t Eliminate Identity Fraud

Saturday, July 19th, 2008

7/14/08 3:00 PM By Rita Zeidner

Federal immigration authorities, fixated on reducing illegal immigration, are increasingly aiming their enforcement efforts at employers.

In a report to Congress, Richard Stana, director of homeland security and justice issues at the Government Accountability Office (GAO), reiterated long-standing criticisms of E-Verify, the electronic employment verification system managed jointly by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Social Security Administration (SSA).

“E-Verify may help employers detect fraudulent documents thereby reducing such fraud, but it cannot yet fully address identity fraud issues,” Stana said.

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Posted in Illegal Immigration, Homeland Security, Worker Authorization, Fraudulent Documents | Comments Off

Meisinger Urges Congress To Replace E-Verify System

Saturday, July 19th, 2008

By J.J. Smith, May 2008

Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) President and CEO Susan R. Meisinger, SPHR, urged Congress to replace the current federal system for verifying employment eligibility with a system already in place in the states that tracks parents who are delinquent in child support payments.

The employee authorization plan supported by SHRM would be implemented under the proposed New Employee Verification Act (NEVA) (H.R. 5515)—introduced by Rep. Sam Johnson, R-Texas—Meisinger said at a May 6, 2008, House Subcommittee on Social Security hearing on the impact employment verification will have on the Social Security Administration.

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Posted in Illegal Immigration, Homeland Security, Worker Authorization, Fraudulent Documents | No Comments »

E-verify’s Weaknesses

Saturday, February 23rd, 2008

The most important thing that needs to be checked in the entire Form I-9 process is the document. Is it real? Does it belong to the person presenting it? The major weakness of the Department of Homeland Security’s E-verify program is that it does not pick up identity theft or fraud. It might not identify those people who are using valid numbers but false documents.

According to the Department of Homeland (DHS) officials, the use of fraudulent documents by aliens is extensive. CBP officers have intercepted tens of thousands of fraudulent documents every year. The types of false documents most frequently intercepted by CBP officers include border crossing cards, alien registration cards, non-immigrant visas, and passports and citizenship documents (both U.S. and foreign). CBP reports that large-scale counterfeiting has made fraudulent employment eligibility documents (e.g., Social Security cards) widely available.

A glaring example of E-Verify’s pitfalls is what happened to Swift & Company, a meatpacking enterprise with operations in several states. The company had used E-Verify for its employees and was under the impression that they were indeed eligible to work. But in a 2006 raid, ICE officials arrested 1,300 people who had used valid - yet stolen - Social Security numbers and other documents in order to work.

Posted in Illegal Immigration, Homeland Security, Worker Authorization, Fraudulent Documents | No Comments »

False Documents of Undocumented Remains Problematic

Sunday, February 3rd, 2008

February 2nd, 2008

By Diane M. Grassi

As the United States Senate and President George Bush try to come to some understanding of what is needed to properly address the illegal entry of non-resident aliens to the United States, for the 12 to 20 million illegal aliens already residing in the U.S., the issue of existing false documentation has yet to be honestly addressed.

But proposed legislation in the Senate leading to a path of legal residency and ultimately citizenship for those illegal aliens presently residing in the U.S. would involve presentation of proof of identity and length of residency.

The problem will be whether or not the illegal or “undocumented” aliens will be willing to admit that their status in the U.S. is illegal, or will continue to maintain that the documentation they hold is valid, even if fraudulent and illegally obtained. In order to do so, there would have to be an amnesty program, but President Bush has insisted that his proposal for legal residency of illegal aliens is not an amnesty program which presents a problem.

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Posted in Illegal Immigration, Homeland Security, Worker Authorization, Fraudulent Documents | No Comments »

Arizona House Bill 2779

Sunday, January 13th, 2008

Phoenix, AZ - State law mandates as of January, 1 2008 all Arizona employers verify that every employee is legally permitted to work in the United States through use of the Department of Homeland Security’s E-Verify System and proper Form I-9 completion.

Now that Electronic Employment Verification is state mandated in Arizona, businesses of all sizes are looking for a simple and cost effective way to comply with the new law. However, when an Arizona company uses the E-verify program they are not totally free from scrutiny, prosecution or business shutdowns.

Case in point, Swift & Co., the company has participated in the federal government’s Basic Pilot worker authorization program for ten years, yet the company was raided by federal agents on December 12, 2006.

Swift & Co. processed the Social Security numbers through the e-verify (basic pilot program) and illegal aliens were cleared for employment.

So what happened? The federal agents searched for illegal immigrants who stole the identities of lawful U.S. residents and used valid Social Security numbers to get jobs at the company. The government detained and removed nearly 1,300 illegal aliens during this raid.

“Swift said it believes the raids violated the agreements associated with the company’s participation over the past ten years in the federal government’s Basic Pilot worker authorization program.”

The shutdown and the long road to return operations back to full production; cost Swift & Company between $45 million to $50 million.

If Swift & Company had used Allegiant Solutions as an identity document verification service to screen their employees’ documents, the illegal aliens would have been declined from being hired.

Allegiant Solutions focuses on the source, “the document”. The document is the key to identity verification, not the information on the document. We provide a practical solution to the most difficult ID verification environment; where an individual who is seeking identity verification is unknown to the verifier. We do this by verifying that the document is valid and that it belongs to the bearer through a series of questions comparing the security features against a known source document.

Allegiant Solutions has numerous applications, such as employment verification (Form I-9 compliance), resident screening, and any situation when an identity document needs to be scrutinized or verified.