When hiring new employees the first concern is often “how good of an employee will they be” but in fact the first concern should be “are they actually who they say they are” because regardless of the nature of your business, an employee who isn’t actually who they say they are can wreak havoc on your business when there are no consequences to their real identity.

Former Department of Homeland Security Chief Chertoff stated; “I’m going to submit to you that in the 21st Century, the most important asset that we have to protect as individuals and as part of our nation is the control of our identity, who we are, how we identify ourselves, whether other people are permitted to masquerade and pretend to be us, and thereby damage our livelihood, damage our assets, damage our reputation, damage our standing in our community.”

We are functioning in an environment in which IDs have yet to be verified or authenticated. There are hundreds of forms of identification in circulation with little security, the Social Security number is a national ID available everywhere, there are thousands of variations of the birth certificate, there are kids on college campuses everywhere selling fake IDs and credit is wide open.

All these fake IDs contribute to the exasperating problem of imposter fraud.

Get the ID Checking Guide to assist you with employee ID verification. “Whether for initial screening or final ID check, verifying ID is important. By reducing inappropriate employment applications, time is saved and later errors or litigation averted. Our references are quick and easy-to-use, with clear indication of the security features that help to verify ID.”

Eventually fake ID detection methods like Smart-cards, biometrics in all its forms, multi-factor authentication and other identity verification methods will help form trusted identities and being an imposter won’t be so easy.