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Ohio lawmakers have asked Congress to take action on millions lost to SNAP benefits theft

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COLUMBUS, Ohio (Statehouse News Bureau) — Thousands of recipients of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program or SNAP benefits in Ohio have found their benefits cards compromised by hackers during the past year. Now there’s a bipartisan resolution to urge Congress to beef up the food stamp system to prevent losses in the future.

The Ohio Department of Job and Family Services issued more than $12.6 million in reimbursements to SNAP recipients between October 2022 and the end of last year. Much of that lost money was due to fraud by hackers and scammers. The state has been urging recipients to change the passwords on their accounts and take other steps to protect their electronic benefit transfer or EBT cards against fraud.

Some state lawmakers think more needs to be done

Sen. Tim Schaffer (R-Lancaster) is sponsoring a bipartisan resolution to urge Congress to take action by issuing federal dollars to cover reimbursements for food stamp fraud. But he said that’s only part of the resolution.

SNAP and EBT Accepted here sign.
[Jonathan Weiss | shutterstock.com]
“We are also in this resolution asking the federal government to increase the security of these cards and to maybe step up the technology to make sure these families are not going without their benefits and that the federal government is not having to pay twice,” Schaffer said.

EBT cards are swiped at checkout counters. But Schaffer wants the feds to change to cards with embedded chips. He said those are more expensive but include technology that is also more secure.

“The criminal element, unfortunately, can be very smart and even if they are evil, they are very smart in how they steal people’s funds and we have always got to keep the technology a step ahead of them,” Schaffer said.

Sens. Willis Blackshear (D-Dayton), Hearcel Craig (D-Columbus) and Kent Smith (D-Euclid) are cosponsors of the resolution. It has been assigned to the Senate Workforce Development Committee.