The IRS is now starting to require taxpayers to utilize facial recognition to access the IRS website. While this is being done to thwart identity thieves from stealing tax refunds, the IRS has contracted a private company, rather than administer the program themselves. Of course, this means that a random company will now have access to your biometric profile.
What’s worse is that the company, ID.me, forces you to agree to terms of service where they can share your data with the police, government and random “select partners.” On top of this, creating your biometric profile can take upwards of 3 hours, or even more if it cannot be automated! Unfortunately, the move is part of a growing trend by companies, local governments, and even nations to embrace the use of biometric data for a variety of purposes, so biometric profiles may be here to stay.
