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AI Case Study

Bypassing ID.me Identity Verification - AI Case Study

An individual filed at least 180 false unemployment claims in the state of California from October 2020 to December 2021 by bypassing ID.me's automated identity verification system. Dozens of fraudulent claims were approved and the individual received at least $3.4 million in payments. The individual collected several real identities and obtained fake driver licenses using the stolen personal details and photos of...

IncidentCalifornia Employment Development DepartmentOne individualAI Model AccessInitial AccessImpact

Overview

Case steps3Steps described in the case record.
Techniques3Attack methods mentioned in the case steps.
Linked CVEs0Known vulnerabilities mentioned in the record.

Risk patterns

Patterns found in the case record and its linked vulnerabilities.

  • 1Dominant ATLAS tactic. AI Model Access appears in 1 case steps.
  • 2Multiple attack methods. The case connects to 3 unique AI attack methods.

Procedure timeline

Search the case steps or filter them by attacker goal.

AI Model Access1Initial Access1Impact1
  1. AI Model Access

    The individual applied for unemployment assistance with the California Employment Development Department using forged identities, interacting with ID.me's identity verification system in the process. The system extracts content from a photo of an ID, validates the authenticity of the ID using a combination of AI and proprietary methods, then performs facial recognition to match the ID photo to a selfie. <sup>[[7]](https://network.id.me/wp-content/uploads/Document-Verification-Use-Machine-Vision-and-AI-to-Extract-Content-and-Verify-the-Authenticity-1.pdf)</sup> The individual identified that the California Employment Development Department relied on a third party service, ID.me, to verify individuals' identities. The ID.me website outlines the steps to verify an identity, including entering personal information, uploading a driver license, and submitting a selfie photo.

  2. Initial Access

    The individual collected stolen identities, including names, dates of birth, and Social Security numbers. and used them along with a photo of himself wearing wigs to acquire fake driver's licenses. The individual uploaded forged IDs along with a selfie. The ID.me document verification system matched the selfie to the ID photo, allowing some fraudulent claims to proceed in the application pipeline.

  3. Impact

    Dozens out of at least 180 fraudulent claims were ultimately approved and the individual received at least $3.4 million in unemployment assistance.

Mitigations

Defenses connected to the attack methods in this case.

Sources

Original public records and references for this case.

Original source

Original source links

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