More than 100,000 employers have signed up to participate in the E-Verify, a federal government program that enables participating employers to verify the employment eligibility of newly-hired employees online, USCIS says.

Employers have run more than two million queries through the system since October 2008, and employers have been able to automatically verify more than 18 million workers’ eligibility since 1997, according to the agency. Currently, approximately 96.1 percent of qualified employees are cleared automatically by E-Verify, and 99.6 percent of all work-authorized employees are verified without receiving a tentative non-confirmation or having to take any type of corrective action, USCIS says.

USCIS plans to make additional enhancements in 2009 to E-Verify and the employment authorization process, including amending the list of acceptable identity documents workers may present to employers to verify employment eligibility and adding passport data and photos to the system to reduce identity theft. Beginning this month, the federal government will require that certain federal contracts contain a clause requiring the contractor and certain subcontractors to use E-Verify, and an updated fact sheet has been issued by USCIS.