Desperately Seeking Sources
Facebook wants a copy of my government-issued ID. Are they asking for yours, too?
Update 5/23/21 — The digital roadblocks to finding real people to talk to about this stuff during the research process have been really surprising. But … the good people behind Reddit’s r/privacy have helped a girl out. I’ll be hosting a rolling AMA at r/privacy on 5/28 @ 12 p.m. until 5/30 @ 12 p.m. E.S.T. If you have concerns about social media identity verification policies, or if you have a personal story of your own to share about them, please join us!
Update 2/15/22 — Revisiting this post; after learning that most Big Tech companies partake in this practice, I wrote a piece for Lifewire exploring the potential risks of tech companies collecting their users’ IDs in July 2021.
Update 8/3/22 — LinkedIn has me locked out and is asking for my ID now, too. Cool.
A little over seven months ago, a friend brought it to my attention that my old Facebook profile (which I believed I had deleted in 2019) appeared to be online again.
Huh. That’s weird.
I didn’t know how it had sprung back to life, but I wasn’t particularly worried about it. It seemed like an easy fix. I could just log back in and request its deletion (again) … right?
My first login attempt felt like the normal process. The emailed code was sent to the address associated with the account; then a security code was texted to my phone number. Nothing unusual so far, at least as far as logging into old profiles goes.
This time, though, those codes weren’t enough. I was told that my three “trusted contacts” would now be sent codes to provide me with so that I could finally log in and delete my account. After contacting each of those three friends about the situation, we waited.
The codes never arrived … and there was nothing I could do about it.
Even though I had followed the instructions and entered the recovery codes sent to the phone number and email address associated with my account, without those extra three codes, Facebook still didn’t believe that I was, well, me.
My profile was automatically locked, rendering it invisible to friends — and inaccessible to me.
To restore my access to my profile, Facebook wanted me to upload a copy of my government-issued ID or other personal identifying documents.
Umm …
In case I didn’t want to send them my ID out of concern for, say, my safety or the potential for identity theft, the company also listed other documents on their website that they would accept instead — including voter ID cards, immigration cards, birth certificates, passports, bank statements, paycheck stubs, health insurance documents and more.
According to a page on the company’s website about the policy, Facebook claims they will store those uploaded documents “securely,” in some cases for up to a year, and notes they “may also partner with trusted service providers to confirm your identity.” The page also mentions that the uploaded documents may be used in developing a system for “detecting fake IDs and related abuse.”
The page does not give specific details about their encryption protocol, how their ID detection system works, or whether outside agencies or contractors would be granted access to it. They also don’t specify who their “trusted service partners” are, or how the public can be sure their information is safe with those partners. (I’ve sent Facebook’s privacy team an email asking about those points and others; I’ll keep everyone posted if I receive any answers.)
After spending about half a year emailing back and forth with the company’s Privacy Operations team, I’ve gotten pretty much nowhere.
That said, this post isn’t actually about me — it’s about you. I’m curious to know who else has had this experience with Facebook, how this policy has affected users, and how other people feel about it.
It’s a story I’m interested in telling.
If your Facebook profile has been locked and the company won’t restore your access to it unless you send them a copy of your government-issued ID or other personal identifying documents, I want to hear about your experience.
You can contact me via my website’s contact form or email me at tips [at] erinmariemiller [dot] com.