"To open a checking or savings account, the bank or credit union will need to verify your name, date of birth, address, and ID number. An ID number can be a social security number or an Individual Taxpayer Identification Number (ITIN). To get an ITIN, you will need to fill out a form with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) .

If you don’t have a U.S. government-issued SSN or ITIN, some banks and credit unions will accept a passport number and country of issuance, an alien identification card number, or other government-issued ID number." [1]

[1] https://www.consumerfinance.gov/ask-cfpb/can-i-get-a-checkin...

Sounds good. So technically an ID is not needed.

Just to make sure we are on the same page, we are equating "ID" to a physical identification card, right? Since I think that's what this conversation stemmed from.

I bet those credit unions were just running my Social Security Number against a database to make sure it matched with the name, DOB, etc I provided.

I wonder if there is a legal definition of "verify" when it comes to banks and customers. Verifying could just be asking the customer, what their name is.

Since they need to verify your address as well I presume IDing with social security card also require providing a piece of mail.

Getting someone’s social security card is hard so this plus a piece of mail or government picture IDs seem fair for an election. Basically, the banking bar.