Skip to Content
Logo
Menu
  • About Our Firm
  • Practice Areas
  • Our People
  • Learning Library
  • Corporate Transparency Act
  • Contact
  • Make A Payment

Fraudulent Unemployment Claims on the Rise in Illinois

Fraudulent Unemployment Claims on the Rise in Illinois

December 4, 2020

The Illinois Department of Employment Security (“IDES”) is inundated with reports of employed individuals receiving letters from the state approving them for unemployment benefits they never applied for. More than half a dozen CCM clients have contacted us about this situation. Businesses that haven’t laid off any employees are receiving letters claiming their employees were laid off and applied for unemployment benefits.

The COVID-19 pandemic has given rise to over 212,000 fraudulent claims for unemployment benefits since March. Of the 212,000 fraudulent claims, 169,506 were filed with a program created through the federal coronavirus relief package that offers benefits to non-traditional employees (self-employed and gig workers). The other 42,496 fraudulent claims were filed as regular state benefits.

According to Illinois officials, the federal program was vulnerable because typical safeguards that IDES uses to identify fraudulent claims, like sending letters to employers, aren’t possible with self-employed workers. IDES denies that the exponential rise in fraudulent claims has anything to do with their own security measures, and instead says it is likely the result of past security breaches, like the 2017 Equifax hack which affected 5.4 million Illinois residents.

The FBI believes these claims are being submitted by cybercriminals who impersonate their victims using stolen identities. Once the benefits are approved, criminals exploit security flaws in the IDES system to seize recipient accounts and request the money be sent to their own accounts.

Takeaways

If your business receives unemployment claims for employees who are still employed, protest the claims using the normal IDES procedures. Also, be sure to notify the employee whose name was used so that employee can ensure that their identity is safe.

Both the federal government through the Federal Trade Commission and the Illinois Attorney General have helpful information for anyone who suspects that their identity has been stolen.

While victims of identity theft are not liable for unemployment benefits paid in their name, it is crucial they report the theft as soon as they are made aware of the fraud. Failure to do so could result in possible tax repercussions. As always, we are available to assist if these measures do not fix the problem.

Related Attorneys

Clingen Callow & McLean, LLC
Lisle Office
2300 Cabot Drive, Suite 500
Lisle, Illinois, 60532
Phone 630.871.2600
Geneva Office
21 North 4th Street
Geneva, Illinois, 60134
Phone 630.938.4769
Fax 630.871.9869
General Inquires [email protected]
  • facebook
  • linkedin

Contact Us

©2025 Clingen Callow & McLean, LLC. All rights reserved.

Law Firm Web Design by NMC

Manage Consent
To provide the best experiences, we use technologies like cookies to store and/or access device information. Consenting to these technologies will allow us to process data such as browsing behavior or unique IDs on this site. Not consenting or withdrawing consent, may adversely affect certain features and functions.
Functional Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
Manage options Manage services Manage {vendor_count} vendors Read more about these purposes
View preferences
{title} {title} {title}