Kyle Nelson
Vice President of Strategic PartnershipsIn this article
Multiple times a day, every day, we get requests to verify our identity. Whether trying to log into a bank account, access work emails, or open our laptop, we must repeatedly prove, “I am who I say I am.”
This process is more digital—and dangerous—than ever before. With artificial intelligence (AI) making identity fraud faster and cheaper, organizations across the globe are in an AI arms race with fraudsters, each trying to outpace the other in the battle over fake IDs.
Identity verification is growing in both the number of individual ID checks each year and how much organizations spend on the process. But many questions remain.
Even if IDs are increasingly digital, are we past traditional paper-and-pen fraud? With sophisticated scams, what methods can organizations deploy to catch fraud?
With so much growth and change, we’re asking, “What are today’s current trends in ID verification, and where is the industry going?” Read our top trends for ID verification now and in the future.
1. Identity Verification is Growing with No Signs of Slowing Down
Identity verification is an expanding, global industry. Billions of people log into applications, open bank accounts, and go through airports every single day. Each of those interactions could involve some form of identity verification.
Globally, all those checks add up. According to Juniper Research’s Global Digital ID Verification Market 2024–2029 report, 75 billion ID verifications occurred worldwide in 2024, a number that’s expected to grow to 86 billion in 2025.
Those checks translate into financial gains. Market forecasts predict that ID verification revenue will reach $21.8 billion worldwide in 2028, up from $10.9 billion in 2023.
These increases are in response to our growing digital footprints and a mushrooming ID fraud landscape. LexisNexis found that over $1 trillion was lost to scams across the world in 2023 alone, according to its Global State of Fraud and Identity Report.
2. ID Fraud is Faster and Cheaper with AI
Identity fraud cases have grown 12% annually since 2020. The pandemic and the rise of AI-enabled fraud have accelerated this trend. Thanks to AI, fraudsters can create a fake ID for as little as $15 in just minutes.
Cybercriminals can quickly create synthetic identities by feeding a mixture of real, stolen, and fake information into an AI tool to generate a profile for a believable but non-existent person.
Fraudsters aren’t just individuals working out of basements, either. Some are well-equipped organizations with global reach, like “fraud-as-a-service” (FaaS) groups that offer customer support, tutorials, and service guarantees.
Over half of surveyed fraud analysts worldwide reported seeing a FaaS scheme, according to Ravelin’s 2023 Fraud Survey. Thanks to FaaS, anyone can easily buy, download, and alter templates to forge documents used in identity verification:
A serious concern for consumers and businesses alike is the threat posed by deepfakes. With AI, fraudsters can create convincing video and audio clips that try to bypass voice and selfie verification.
And these fears aren’t unfounded—a 2024 deepfake survey by Regula Forensics found that half of all surveyed businesses experienced fraud involving audio and video deepfakes. This trend is especially stark in financial services:
The Wall Street Journal reported that deepfake incidents increased 700% in the financial technology sector in 2023.
It’s not just the number of businesses or the percentage increase. The dollars lost add up, too. In an infographic titled “The Perfect Storm: AI, ChatGPT, and Deepfake Threats on Government Agencies,” LexisNexis demonstrated that AI-enabled fraud can leave widespread damage in its wake and could cost $10.5 trillion in 2025.
With so much at stake for both businesses and consumers, more and more organizations are investing in AI to outmaneuver and outsmart the opposition.
3. Companies are Fighting Fire with Fire through AI
With AI software available online to all, fighting ID fraud might seem hopeless. But cybersecurity experts haven’t given up yet. They’re also looking to AI to help them catch ID fraud through:
Behavioral anomaly detection. Deviations in typing, usage behavior, and other user characteristics can indicate that someone may be impersonating an account’s owner.
Liveness detection. Techniques like 3D facial mapping, blinking, and movement detection can help ID verifiers confirm they’re looking at a real, live person—or a photo.
Biometrics. Your face, fingerprints, iris, and voice are unique, and biometric scans of these features have increased over time. Pair them with liveness detection and your user behavior, and it’s much harder for someone to pretend to be you.
Advanced document verification. AI can ferret out even tiny, imperceptible anomalies in spacing, font, or data to detect fraudulent documents.
Precedence Research predicts that AI in fraud management and ID verification will grow to $65.35 billion worldwide by 2034, up from $14.72 billion in 2024. Financial organizations, in particular, are investing. Alloy’s 2025 State of Fraud Report found that 99% of financial organizations have used AI to combat fraud tactics.
4. Liveness and Biometrics are Increasingly Critical to ID Verification
With forged IDs and deepfakes on the rise, more and more organizations are looking to liveness checks or biometrics to answer the questions, “Are you who you say you are?” and “Are you even real?”
In its 2025 State of Fraud Report, Alloy reported that 43% of financial organizations use selfie or liveness tests whenever they catch a fraud red flag.
And it’s not just companies that want biometrics in ID verification. In the FIDO Alliance’s ebook, Remote ID Verification – Bringing Confidence to Biometric Systems Consumer Insights 2024, the alliance reported that 49% of US consumers want to use biometrics when verifying their identities with banks.
This trend isn’t necessarily new. Even as far back as 2018, Mastercard found that 93% of their customers preferred biometrics over passwords because of their ease of use and enhanced security.
After all, biometrics can dramatically speed up ID verification, creating benefits for both organizations and consumers. For example, Miami International Airport experienced an 80% decrease in processing times after it introduced biometrics.
5. Digital and Mobile IDs are on the Rise
With digital verification’s speed and ease of use, more IDs are going mobile and into smartphones. The New York Times reported in 2024 that over 80% of Gen Z use mobile wallets, and that trend is extending beyond payment methods to include mobile IDs.
With a mobile ID, users can store a digital version of their driver’s license or other ID document in their smartphone wallet. Rather than presenting a physical ID, users can tap their phone or display a QR code to verify their identity.
This technology is spreading across the US. Thirteen states have mobile driver’s license programs, with up to 70% of states expected to launch their own program. And as of June 2024, 27 airports across the US have accepted digital IDs.
The advantages aren’t just for airports or travelers—entire economies could benefit from them. The Information Technology & Innovation Foundation estimated that full digital ID adoption in the US could generate an economic value of 4% of GDP in 2030.
Corporations are taking note, too. Uber partnered with CLEAR in 2024 to help riders get a “Verified” badge more easily, letting drivers know who’s getting into their car.
Amazon is also planning to accept mobile driver’s licenses for age-restricted purchases, prescriptions, and account recovery, according to a conversation between Amazon and Truvera.
6. Don’t Forget About Traditional ID Verification Anytime Soon
The world may seem to have moved completely online, but digital ID verification is only part of the story. Don’t write off paper-and-pen fraud just yet—Regula Forensics’ deepfake survey found that 58% of companies still come across “traditional threats,” like altered physical documents.
But the balance is tipping. LexisNexis’ True Cost of Fraud Study found that digital channels accounted for 51% of fraud in 2023, just surpassing physical channels.
7. Regulations are Increasing and Expanding
Just as ID verification methods are changing and adapting to a new reality, the regulatory environment around ID verification is evolving, too. Forrester Consulting reported that 76% of survey respondents saw an increase in regulatory requirements that call for stronger ID verification.
This trend is global. The EU’s electronic identification and trust services (eIDAS) came into effect on May 20, 2024, with full adoption by EU member states by 2026. This regulation requires that member states recognize each other’s electronic IDs and trust services. This set of regulations joins other data- and transaction-related regulations, like the Payment Service Directive II (PSD2) and GDPR.
Domestically, many organizations—like banks—must comply with Know Your Customer and Anti-Money Laundering laws to ensure financial institutions don’t provide services to terrorists or traffickers.
And it’s not just banks—19 states in the US have age verification laws that require some form of ID verification for industries like sports betting and hospitality.
But even as more states look to use ID verification to enforce laws, privacy and data protection regulations can make it harder for organizations to collect documents and information to verify IDs.
For example, 20 states have data privacy laws, such as the California Consumer Privacy Act, which sets strict rules on how consumer data can be collected, stored, and shared.
This complex web of regulations and compliance is prompting more ID verification providers to prioritize differentiation by receiving certifications such as SOC2, ISO, and FedRAMP.
What’s Next for ID Verification?
Identity verification is still straddling two worlds—on the one hand, digital scams are becoming more sophisticated, requiring ID verifiers to find novel ways to fight fraud.
On the other, fraud through physical channels won’t disappear anytime soon, even if mobile driver’s licenses and digital IDs are on the rise.
The identity verification industry will continue using AI to fight the new and complex forms of both digital and physical fraud. But they’ll have to balance technical advances with legal compliance and a growing body of regulations worldwide.
Expect to see more advanced ID verification technology, industry expansion, and new forms of fraud. Want to learn more about it? Check out identity fraud statistics for 2025.