Fraudsters likely stole $45.6 billion from U.S. COVID unemployment insurance program

Fraudsters likely stole $45.6 billion from the United States' unemployment insurance program during the COVID-19 pandemic by applying tactics like using Social Security numbers of deceased individuals, a federal watchdog said on Thursday.

About a year ago, nearly $16 billion in potential fraud had been identified. The report issued Thursday by the inspector general for the U.S. Labor Department identified "an increase of $29.6 billion in potentially fraudulent payments."

The scammers had allegedly filed billions of dollars in unemployment claims in many states simultaneously while some of them got benefits using the identities of dead people and prisoners who were not eligible for aid. They also relied on suspicious emails that were hard to trace, the watchdog said in its report.