‘Who is this man?’: Thousands of Michigan residents issued IDs, all with the same stranger’s face on them
Thousands of Michigan residents have been left baffled by a bizarre error on their IDs, resulting in the face of a man they don’t know being printed on the document. Approximately 8,200 Driver’s licenses and state ID cards have been affected by the strange glitch.
According to the Michigan Secretary of State’s Office, the ID cards were printed on August 26 by Idemia, the state’s vendor. Images of the card shared online show that the cardholder’s information in the bottom right has been replaced by a photo of a black man, along with a fake date of birth, according to The New York Post.
“I kept looking, and I was like, ‘That’s a man in the bottom corner,’” Michigan resident Lanita Nelson told CBS Detroit. “And I keep looking, and he’s smiling. I’m like, ‘What’s going on?’” Upon closer inspection, she also noticed that the birth date next to the picture was wrong too. “There is a whole Black man’s face down on the bottom right of my license with a fake birthday; January 12, ’67,” she said. “I’m like, ‘No, this doesn’t apply to me. This can’t be right.”
The error means the IDs are not valid for the 8,200 residents who received them. State officials also confirmed that “The misprinted information is generic and is not the information of another resident.” The photo was also not that of another customer, but rather a stock photo.
Thousands of Michigan residents were affected
Nelson did a Google search, asking, “Who is this man on my enhanced license?” and quickly learnt that she was not the only person to have been affected by the peculiar misprint, as thousands of others all had IDs containing the same stranger’s face. On social media, others had asked the same question after discovering the strange picture and fake information on their cards too.
Nelson expressed concern over whether her ID would be valid or safe for her to use should she be pulled over while driving. “If I show this to the police, and I mess around and get pulled over, they are going to try to take me to jail.” She said, adding, “I have to figure this out.”
Customers affected by the misprint likely won’t have to wait long for the problem to be fixed, as the Michigan Department of State claimed that corrected cards had already been issued to everyone who had been erroneously given the IDs. Residents reportedly do no need to report the mistake or request a replacement.
Until they receive their new cards, customers can also print a temporary license or ID online or head to a Secretary of State branch office.
(Featured image CBS Detroit)
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