IRS Reverses Course on Facial Recognition

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has reversed a decision to required taxpayers to provide facial recognition data through a third party vendor to access some tax services.

Instead, the IRS announced it would work toward providing an alternative form of verification.

The announcement came after Senator John Tester (D-MT) sent a letter to the IRS opposing the planned requirements.

“I don’t know where it came from, but it is a bad idea,” Tester told The Courier during a telephonic press conference late last week.

And, I am being generous when I am saying ‘bad idea,’” Tester continued. “This is the kind of garbage that drives me crazy. Since it is going to a third party ... they could sell it China, for goodness sake. They could do all sorts of things with it. It is just bad, not to mention that they have no business using facial recognition software to access IRS services. I hope I have made my position clear. This is garbage. I do not believe the IRS authorized this [through Congress] and we are working on a number of efforts here to shut this down, because, quite honestly, this has no business being in any portfolio in the government, much less the IRS. I can’t make that position more clear. This is insanity at the top level.”

As of this summer, visitors to the IRS website needing to access the Child Tax Credit Update Portal, check online accounts, get their tax transcript, receive an ID Protection PIN or view an online payment agreement would have been forced to create an account through ID.ME. Former authentication measures using an email address and password to access would no longer have been an option.

Instead, taxpayers would have been forced to provide ID.me with their email address, Social Security number, photo ID and take a “selfie” so their face can be scanned to ensure they are who they say they are.

The IRS had stated taxpayers would not have needed to use ID.me or any facial-recognition software to submit tax returns.

Tester said he is a staunch defender of Montanans’ right to privacy, and noted he recently introduced the bipartisan “Not For Sale Act,” which would close loopholes that allow the government to circumvent the Fourth Amendment by buying data from third-party data brokers, using improperly obtained data for facial recognition, and collecting information about Americans’ web browsing without a warrant.

Tester said he has continually condemned the use of mass and warrantless government surveillance, and is one of only a handful of Senators that has consistently voted against reauthorizing the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). He has also taken a stand against the unregulated online data collection by private companies and pushed for more transparency for consumers.