In a December 11 webinar by Trinsic (a leading infrastructure for issuing and accepting reusable ID credentials), it was stated that half of U.S. states will be debuting mobile drivers licenses (mDL) in 2025. Identification fraud watchdog groups and related organizations have recently published multiple reports on the increase in digital financial fraud, often tied back to identification impersonation in the cyber domaine. The relationship of government interaction, banking, digital ID apps and biometrics is rapidly becoming more intertwined.
The two forces of digital identity systems and the increase in identity-related cyber fraud intersect in what may become a problem, reaction, solution paradigm leading to greater mandates of big brother track-and-trace control mechanisms.
Digital identification is preformed through smartphone apps, with various systems currently deploying throughout the globe. These systems tie a person’s biometric information to their app in order to verify who they are. While 2025 will see a massive increase in digital ID apps going on-line, mandatory biometric scans have become standard practice in many countries throughout the first few decades of the 21st century.
Trinsic’s webinar covered advancements in mDLs over 2024 and how that points toward the future of identification, with the company CEO Riley Hughes predicting that in 2025, 50 percent of U.S. states will have active mDL programs. Currently 14 states have active mDL programs with 15 more states planning their mDL launches soon and nearly 70 percent of states anticipating to adopt mDLs.
The Trinsic CEO also discussed the increase in private sector acceptance of digital ID (such as bars verifying patron’s age for example) and the increase in national identification systems implementing a digital ID (allowing one’s smartphone to replace their national ID card).
While the move to migrate people’s identification documents from a card to a smartphone is currently underway, a trend of increasing financial fraud on the internet, reportedly related to ‘authorization’ issues, is manifesting itself. While critics of a digital ID will point out that digitizing identification credentials would increase this risk, proponents of such systems believe a digital ID will mitigate the risk.
Credit reporting company Experian published their 2024 Global Identity and Fraud Report which discussed the increasing use of mobile payment apps, increasing incidences of financial fraud and increases of AI being used to spoof current identification verification models related to live selfie facial recognition systems via smartphones. Private companies are also reported to be investing more into fraud prevention systems as the public becomes more wary of identity theft and more accepting of biometric collection. One example would be medical providers who now scan the palms or faces of patients when they check into their appointments.
Most shockingly however is Experian’s ‘prospective’, which touts biometric scans of people’s faces and retinal scans of their eyeballs as ‘essential’ components, yet due to advancements in generative AI and deepfake technologies, they must be complemented with continuous monitoring of an individual’s activities and behavior. Notably, iris scans record the outer part of the eyeball, making them able to be captured by a camera at distance. Retina scans record the back of the eyeball, necessitating close proximity and a specialized scanner.
“Advanced technologies like facial recognition and retinal scans are essential components of any firm’s verification and authentication strategy. However, in the age of GenAI and deepfake technology, they are no longer sufficient on their own,” Experian’s report said in its ‘prospective’ on biometrics. “To enhance online consumer identification without unnecessary interruptions, businesses need to implement a comprehensive layered fraud prevention strategy that utilizes various methods and frictionless technologies. Incorporating multiple passive technologies—such as behavioral biometrics, device intelligence, and phone intelligence—alongside advanced analytics enables continuous monitoring of consumer behavior across the user journey.”
Veriff, an AI-powered identity verification platform for fraud prevention, compliance and safeguarding customers, recently published their Identity Fraud Report for 2025. It revealed an increasing fraud challenge in the new year. According to the report, fraud follows money and as such fraudsters targeting e-commerce platforms, with impersonation attacks, now dominate the digital fraud landscape.
“Veriff pointed to the rise of face swaps to defeat biometric checks, lip syncing, GANS and autoencoders, and perhaps most intriguingly, ‘puppets.’ This latter biometric spoof is when a video records the desired movements of an actor, or the ‘master,’ which is then overlaid onto a video of the target subject, with the ‘puppet’ then appearing to move like the master. It’s difficult to detect and can defeat active liveness solutions, according to Veriff,” Biometric Update said Thursday.
The Identity Theft Resource Center (ITRC) published their 2025 Predictions and 2024 Predictions Recap Report which detailed 2024’s massive increases in fraud related to digital medical records, health insurance and digital identification. The report said these increases will drive greater adoption of biometric technologies, of which the privacy concerns will be overshadowed by the ‘legitimate use cases’, following the emotional toll on the victims of identity theft. For 2025 the report predicts cybercrime will boom and a decrease in federal enforcement and prosecutions over fraud-related crimes will take place. It also predicts an increase in private institutions (such as banks) implementing mitigation strategies (perhaps more biometric-based systems).
A very large percentage of countries already scan various biometrics of every single citizen as part of national identification programs. Failure to comply with biometrics scanning can result in being de-banked, a move multiple countries are currently initiating, to being in violation of the law, depending on the country. Some countries scan individuals into their systems at birth, others preform the procedure when an individual reaches their teenage years and gets an ID card.
For example, every citizen of South Korea is required to have all 10 fingerprints scanned into the National Police criminal database at age 17 as part of their mandatory national ID card.
Identification of virtually every citizen in India is preformed via the scanning of all 10 fingerprints and the iris’s of both eyes. While India doesn’t require the process by law, identification in the system is required for financial and governmental services, a de facto requirement, as it is necessary for having a job, being paid and owning or renting property.
Brazil has federal requirements for compulsory registration of every infant’s fingerprints and footprints at birth which are permanently stored in their identification record and later able to be used for vaccination programs and school registration. The country plans to link these biometrics to their national ID card. This is in addition to Brazil also fingerprinting citizens again when they get their mandatory national ID card. Brazil even intends to begin collecting additional biometrics such as iris scans, facial scans, as well as voice prints and even gait (the way one walks), although that has yet to transpire.
In the private sector, biometrics are collected by far more than just financial services. Gym memberships, school lunch programs and student identification for attendance, medical clinic sign-ins and amusement park admissions are all areas that have already deployed their own biometric verification programs, although, facing pushback, some have abandoned these plans.