Government source-of-truth validation

Confirming that a person's identity actually exists and is in good standing in a government database, not just that their ID document looks real.

For example, a service might send the name, date of birth, and license number from a driver's license to the issuing motor vehicle agency and ask whether they match its records.

Verification that cross-checks a claimed identity directly against an authoritative government record, such as a DMV database, rather than relying solely on document authenticity checks, closing the gap where a document can be genuine but the identity behind it is fabricated.

In the US, one example is the Driver License Data Verification (DLDV) service run by the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators (AAMVA). It checks submitted license or ID details against the issuing agency's records in real time and returns a true or false answer for each detail. It does not return the underlying data, verify a photo or signature, or store the request, and coverage varies by state.

A source-of-truth check typically follows these steps:

1. The service extracts details from the document, such as name, date of birth, and document number.
2. It sends those details to the government data source.
3. The source reports whether each detail matches its record.
4. A mismatch or a missing record triggers a decline or an extra check.

Government source-of-truth validation sits next to terms that are easy to mix up:

• Document verification checks whether the document itself is genuine, while source-of-truth validation checks whether the identity behind it exists.
• Non-document verification matches details against bureau or government records without capturing a document, and a government check is one form of it.
• Synthetic identity fraud builds an identity from real and invented details, which this check is designed to catch.

For more, see the webinar Real Identities, Wrong Person: Why Identity Verification Is Failing.