Half a Million Companies Now Participate in E-Verify, USCIS Announces

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced on January 23, 2014, that more than 500,000 companies now use E-Verify. Employers use the online E-Verify system to check an employee’s work authorization status. USCIS said that 98.8 percent of work-authorized employees are confirmed “instantly or within 24 hours, requiring no further employee or employer action.”

USCIS noted that its efforts to enhance the system’s security include agreements with select states’ departments of motor vehicles to ensure the authenticity of driver’s licenses that employees use as identity documents; Self Check, which allows workers to look up their own employment eligibility status and correct their records before they seek employment; and a program that locks Social Security numbers suspected of being misused for employment eligibility verification.

E-Verify has experienced significant growth since its establishment in 1996. Annual enrollments increased tenfold during the program’s first 16 years, from 11,474 in fiscal year (FY) 1996 to 111,671 in FY 2012. During FY 2013, employers used E-Verify more than 25 million times.

To commemorate the half-million-participant milestone, USCIS released “E-Verify for Business Leaders,” a video that introduces the program to prospective users. USCIS also updated its

E-Verify website with “plain-language” content and easy-to-follow graphics.