![]() ![]() The lack of fraud detection and prevention technology within the USDA’s SNAP program places an enormous burden on law enforcement as well- as they need to divert significant resources at the federal, state and local level to investigate and hold these groups accountable. Rather than deploying those billions toward helping America’s most needy families, SNAP is in fact one of the largest funders of organized criminal groups in the world. If estimates suggesting that 20% of this amount is lost to fraud are anywhere close to being accurate, it means $33.4 billion vanishing into thin air every year. SNAP boasts an annual budget of a staggering $127 billion. ![]() This system has so few guardrails and fraud-detection tools in place that thousands of EBT cards from California were used in a single Michigan city with no “red flags” alerting anyone as to what was happening.Ĭonsider the magnitude of these losses. In fact, a fraudster could become an EBT retailer by purchasing a point-of-sale terminal on the dark web that’s linked to an “approved” retailer. Like the EDD debacle, these bureaucrats seem completely content to just shovel money out the door with no regard for consequences.Įven worse, in recent federal litigation, it was revealed that retailers who accept SNAP/EBT benefits are not obligated to employ advanced point-of-sale systems, the type that generates transaction records in standard grocery stores. So how is it that they managed to siphon off EBT card numbers and pins with alarming ease? First, the United States Department of Agriculture, which implements the SNAP program, has no incentive to prevent fraud. The criminals stealing access to EBT cards run the gamut from low-level organized criminal gangs in Michigan to criminal syndicates as far-flung as Romania journeying to California, specifically to exploit the gaping security flaws in the SNAP program. And you thought California’s $32 billion in Employment Development Department (EDD) fraud was bad.Ī small group of criminals in Detroit has managed to pilfer the SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) benefits of nearly 8,000 impoverished California families who were shocked when they discovered their EBT cards had been drained. ![]()
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