Facial recognition technology has helped Irish authorities to catch a pension fraudster who illegitimately received more than €100,000 over the course of 12 years, according to a report on Independent.ie.
When Marie McMahon’s sister Katherine moved the US in 1992, she left her social welfare card with a friend, who used it to fraudulently collect the benefits; eventually this friend was hospitalized, and shared the card in turn with Marie, who continued to collect the benefits herself. But in 2013, staff at a social welfare office began to suspect that Marie was not, in fact, Katherine, and subsequently used facial recognition technology to conclusively determine that this was the case.
Confronted by authorities, McMahon has confessed to the crime, and is now remanded on bail, awaiting sentencing in June.
Such use of biometric identification is expanding in Ireland, with the country’s Department of Social Protection having announced last year that a facial recognition system used in conjunction with new ID cards had helped to catch 60 fraudsters who had collectively taken €1 million in illegitimate social assistance. And as the government continues to see the savings in reduced fraud, such programs are likely to be expanded in future.
Source: Independent.ie
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March 10, 2016 – by Alex Perala
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