Ticketmaster said it’s asking some fans to provide a selfie and government-issued ID to get tickets. Ticketmaster said it’s part of a security check to help give real fans, not bots, a fair shot at getting tickets. In an email to NBC 5 Responds, a Ticketmaster spokesperson wrote, “All of ou r security efforts are designed to help protect fans and their tickets. For the vast majority of fans, nothing has changed. In some cases where atypical activity is associated with an account, fans may be asked to complete a quick selfie or, more rarely, provide a government-issued photo id. We aim to use these measures only when necessary and minimize inconvenience for legitimate fans.” Ticketmaster said the security check confirms the account belongs to a real person and their Ticketmaster profile name matches their ID. Ticketmaster said it uses a company called Persona to handle the security check. It said Persona uses encryption and doesn’t share the user’s personal data with third parties – except to the extent necessary to perform the ID verification and prevent fraud and abuse. Ticketmaster’s biometrics privacy notice on its website said limited Live Nation personnel may access the ID and selfie photo stored by Persona for compliance purposes. It said Live Nation doesn’t receive a copy of, or have access to, biometric data. Live Nation is Ticketmaster’s parent company. We asked a cybersecurity consultant about sharing a live photo selfie or ID with companies. Brian Levin, a former cybercrime prosecutor and executive director of FormerGov.com, said he expects consumers will see more companies asking for identity checks as companies battle AI-fueled fraud. “I think consumers should get used to the fact that this is probably going to become a fairly standard process as part of logging on to any sort of important, sensitive system such as their bank account information, cryptocurrency accounts,” Levine said. Ticketmaster’s website said Persona stores verification data for no more than 60 days if the verification is successful. For an unsuccessful verification, it said it may store that data for no more than three years for fraud prevention purposes. You can find Ticketmaster’s help page here. We reached out to Persona. It referred us to Ticketmaster for this story. This story uses functionality that may not work in our app. Click here to open the story in your web browser. ...read more read less