By Emry Dinman

Columbia Basin Herald

OLYMPIA — In response to a dramatic rise in incidents of impostor fraud, when an individual using stolen personal information fraudulently applies for unemployment benefits, the state Employment Security Department has been ramping up its fraud protections.

“While this is an immediate and pressing concern for our department, it is not just happening here in Washington,” agency Commissioner Suzi LeVine said in a statement. “Impostor fraud is a sweeping issue affecting unemployment systems in states across the country. We are working with law enforcement, other states, financial institutions and the U.S. Department of Labor to detect and prevent fraud.”

A report published last week stated the state has paid out hundreds of millions of dollars for fraudulent unemployment claims.

The agency says it has introduced a number of safeguards that may affect valid unemployment claims. One measure is holding unemployment payments for one to two days to validate all claims as authentic. Longer delays for certain accounts are possible as the agency makes changes to its system that will require some customers to verify or provide certain information. The agency has also hired additional fraud investigators and staff for the fraud hotline.

According to the ESD, the widespread fraud currently going on is not due to a data breach from the agency’s system.

“This is happening because bad actors have acquired people’s personal information through other data breaches outside of the agency,” LeVine said in a statement. “Criminals then use this information to fraudulently apply for unemployment benefits in someone else’s name. There has been no data breach from ESD’s system.”

3 things to know about impostor fraud

According to the state Employment Security Department, the three most important things to know about unemployment impostor fraud are:

• A victim of fraud will not have to repay the money.

• A victim of fraud who needs to apply for unemployment benefits still can.

• ESD will only reach out to people from the esd.wa.gov domain and only ask people to provide information at esd.wa.gov. ESD has seen fraudsters offering to help individuals and businesses by sending them to phony web pages asking for their or their employees’ information.

If you believe you are a victim of impostor fraud, ESD says, go to esd.wa.gov/fraud and report it using the instructions on that page.