From: imbibe@mindspring.com   
      
   Epic Covid fraud galls state watchdogs: ‘The system failed at almost every   
   conceivable level’   
   By Atkins, Salam, Ramgopal & Fitzpatrick, April 6, 2022, NBC News   
      
   Not long after pandemic unemployment aid began to flow in Ohio,    
   the state’s top auditor grew concerned. Keith Faber had seen    
   reports that a Nigerian crime ring had scammed Washington state    
   out of millions of dollars. He wanted to know whether the Ohio    
   agency in charge of releasing aid was seeing any evidence of fraud.    
   “They pretty much said: ‘Nothing to see here, ma’am. Just move on,’”    
   Faber recalled.   He soon found out there was, in fact, a lot to see there.    
      
   A statewide audit turned up some highly alarming findings: More than    
   80,000 claims had been paid out to prisoners and more than 140,000 to    
   dead people. Officials now believe the vast majority that came from    
   people who seemed to be behind bars were actually filed by scammers    
   who stole their identities.  The fraud was so pervasive that someone    
   had even filed an unemployment claim for Faber himself.  “When we got it,    
   it shocked me that everything was correct on the claim except for the    
   bank account number,” Faber said.   The claim was denied, but Faber    
   now believes the state doled out more than $5 billion in improper    
   payments, some of which went to cyber scammers at home and abroad who    
   pulled off what has been described as the biggest fraud in a generation.    
      
   Estimates of the stolen aid money start at about $100 billion and    
   stretch as high as $400 billion — nearly half of the Covid unemployment    
   relief program. Experts say it is likely to take years to account for    
   the full scope of the fraud.  Interviews with dozens of people on the    
   front lines, including five state auditors, shed new light on the poor    
   planning and missed red flags that allowed scammers to plunder billions    
   of dollars intended for people who lost jobs during the pandemic.    
      
   “The system failed at almost every conceivable level,” Faber said.   
      
   Congress passed the $2 trillion coronavirus stimulus bill in March 2020,    
   creating a program that provided aid money to self-employed people and    
   gig workers who wouldn't typically be eligible for unemployment insurance.    
   The claimants weren't required to submit documentation to prove their   
   employment.   
   The hard part was left to the states. With the economy in a tailspin, state    
   agencies faced enormous pressure to process an unprecedented flood of    
   unemployment claims as quickly as possible.    
      
   In Mississippi, the Dept of Employment Security dropped basic internal    
   controls, such as checking to see whether applicants were actively    
   seeking work or even whether their IP addresses were from in the state,    
   State Auditor Shad White said.   White said that as he viewed the results    
   of his first audit, he thought to himself: “This is tragic.”   
   “When you see improper payments in a program, it’s disheartening,”    
   White said. “But the thing that makes this particularly disheartening    
   is that the dollar amounts are huge.”  He estimates that the state lost    
   over $500 million in Covid unemployment fraud and overpayments. “These    
   are big dollar totals relative to our overall budget,” he said. “We    
   struggled last year in the state to find another $50 million to increase    
   our public school teacher pay.”    
      
   White said he has had to accept that with much of the fraud carried out    
   by international criminals, there is almost no chance Mississippi will    
   be able to recoup its money.   “I’m not going to be able to get a lot    
   of the money back unless you give me a C-17 and a Black Hawk,” White    
   said sarcastically, referring to U.S. military aircraft.    
      
   In the months after the signing of the CARES Act, Illinois officials    
   signed a $29 million deal with Deloitte Consulting to help vet and    
   process unemployment claims.   But the system they set up had flaws    
   that allowed payments to go out to people whose identities weren’t    
   validated, Illinois Auditor General Frank Mautino said.  “When you    
   have faults within the system, it’s garbage in, garbage out,” he said.   
   The “garbage” included 63 approved claims for people who were 90 or    
   older and 164 for people who were 13 or younger — not the ages normally    
   associated with holding jobs in the U.S.   
      
   Mautino’s initial audit, which was limited to the early part of the    
   program, found that roughly $155 million was paid to suspected    
   fraudsters and other potentially ineligible claimants.   “And that’s    
   within the first seven weeks of data,” he said, referring to the    
   period from May 2020 to the end of June 2020.   
      
   A Deloitte spokeswoman, Karen Walsh, said everyone who applied for    
   pandemic unemployment aid in Illinois had to authenticate themselves    
   using “an industry-leading, third-party identity verification and    
   fraud prevention solution.”  “To date, this process has stopped    
   nearly 624,000 applications until the individuals associated with    
   those claims could provide additional information to confirm their    
   identities,” Walsh said.   
      
   Spokespeople for state workforce agencies in Ohio and Illinois    
   acknowledged that large amounts of fraud took place but said the    
   agencies did the best they could under the extraordinary circumstances.    
   In many states, understaffed agency call centers were swamped.    
   A large number of people had the nightmarish experience of losing    
   their jobs and then seeking aid — only to find out their identities    
   had already been used by fraudsters.  Haley Andrews, 27, a single mom    
   from New Jersey, lost her accounting job in July. Because her identity    
   was stolen, she has spent over 8 months trying to get the state to    
   pay her the $16,000 in unemployment she says she is owed.   With no    
   income or relief money, Andrews could no longer afford child care    
   for her two kids, ages 7 and 1. In November, she began working for    
   DoorDash to make ends meet, delivering food to people with her 2 kids    
   in the back seat of her Jeep.  “My life has been ruined,” Andrews said.   
      
   While most scammers are believed to have mined the dark web to steal    
   people’s identities, some are accused of carrying out appalling crimes.   
   A caregiver for the intellectually disabled filed more than $100,000    
   in fraudulent unemployment claims in Pennsylvania and New Jersey using    
      
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