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"with certain customers who are at higher risk of fraud — including all state unemployment agencies it works with — facial recognition. If a person filing for unemployment benefits fails the facial recognition step a few times, they'll be directed to a video chat where they must show identification..."

This sounds reasonable given the current situation. Washington state alone lost ~1b to fraudulent claims during the pandemic (that's almost $3000 per taxpayer). If you are going to allow people to file online, you absolutely need to verify their identity.

That being said. Verifying by mailing address or in person seem more effecvive, fraud resistant, auditable, reliable, don't rely on a contractor etc.

Unfortunately it seems thay many of the pandemic era "temporary" solutions are simply going to become the norm because of inertia.




Queue HN pedantry in 3... 2... 1...

$1_000_000_000 in claims

7_615_000 WA state population

1_000_000_000 / 7_615_000 = 131.319763624 $/person


I multiplied by 3 at the end since kids and unemployed don't pay taxes but you're right ty.


>Washington state alone lost ~1b to fraudulent claims during the pandemic

Wild. Where did you see that?


1.1b seems to be the upper bound, but potentially closer to ~640m according to the Seattle times.

www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/auditor-state-unemployment-system-wholly-unprepared-for-fraud-one-agency-employee-under-criminal-investigation/%3famp=1




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