E‑Verify: The Surveillance Solution

The federal government will keep data about every person submitted to the “E‑Verify” background check system for 10 years.


At least that’s my read of the slightly unclear notice describing the “United States Citizenship Immigration Services 009 Compliance Tracking and Monitoring System” in today’s Federal Register. (A second notice exempts this data from many protections of the Privacy Act.)


To make sure that people aren’t abusing E‑Verify, the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services Verification Division, Monitoring and Compliance Branch will watch how the system is used. It will look for misuse, such as when a single Social Security Number is submitted to the system many times, which suggests that it is being used fraudulently.


How do you look for this kind of misuse (and others, more clever)? You collect all the data that goes into the system and mine it for patterns consistent with misuse.


The notice purports to limit the range of people whose data will be held in the system, listing “Individuals who are the subject of E‑Verify or SAVE verifications and whose employer is subject to compliance activities.” But if the Monitoring Compliance Branch is going to find what it’s looking for, it’s going to look at data about all individuals submitted to E‑Verify. “Employer subject to compliance activities” is not a limitation because all employers will be subject to “compliance activities” simply for using the system.


In my paper on electronic employment eligibility verification systems like E‑Verify, I wrote how such systems “would add to the data stores throughout the federal government that continually amass information about the lives, livelihoods, activities, and interests of everyone — especially law‐​abiding citizens.”


It’s in the DNA of E‑Verify to facilitate surveillance of every American worker. Today’s Federal Register notice is confirmation of that.