The US Internal Revenue Service is considering whether artificial intelligence could help assess the complexity of identity-theft cases and route them to appropriately trained employees. The proposal appears in the agency’s response to a Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration audit; the report does not say that an AI triage system has already been deployed.
Most delay occurs before assignment
The audit found that identity-theft victims waited an average of roughly 20 months for resolution across fiscal years 2023 through 2025, compared with the agency’s 120-day objective. Cases in the audit sample spent most of that time in unassigned inventory. The unresolved workload had fallen from earlier levels but still stood near 257,000 cases in May 2026.
TIGTA recommended evaluating case complexity before assignment and moving claims into active processing more quickly. The IRS agreed to study whether AI could support that work rather than divert experienced identity-theft staff to screen incoming cases.
Automation needs auditable safeguards
Any triage model used for identity-fraud cases would need documented routing criteria, human review, bias testing and an appeal path for misclassified claims. Performance should be measured against resolution time and error rates, not only throughput. SectechMedia follows related controls in its identity and access coverage.
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