Selfies To Access One’s IRS Records Not Good Idea Yet?

Thanks to IRS folks serving thru the teeth of a pandemic but no thanks to the agency’s plan to use a controversial new biometric ID to access one’s own tax records, at least, argues the WSJ, in “Face Time With the IRS.”

As the editors noted, it was in November that the tax agency announced “an $86 million partnership with ID.me, a private contractor, to create an ‘improved identification & sign-in process’ for its website.” Taxpayers currently access their IRS records by typing in a username & password. But, starting this summer, ID.me will be asking for “a good deal of personal data” AND a “face scan, with which it will then ‘verify’ a person’s identity, store in a database & use for future logins. What could go wrong?” Plenty, the WSJ worries, since the new ID standard is being prepped “with too little regard for security, privacy or concerns about government power.” For instance, even “selfies” taken with a smart phone may be used in accessing a taxpayer’s account. Huh? The face ID technique, it also notes, has been criticized by academic studies … cited by even a number of Democrats … for being less accurate in verifying “black & Asian faces as well as it does whites.”

The WSJ piles on by noting other agencies might be interested in copycatting the IRS’s idea, including Social Security, then, cites a number of embarrassing past security hacks & leaks at the IRS before concluding: “It’s often said that privacy is a fiction in the internet age, but that’s all the more reason for Congress to scrutinize the tax man when he wants to become a federal photo shop. Put the biometric IRS on hold until we better know the implications of its facial intrusion.”

Davd Soul