Before you apply
Before anyone at DOUSCS reviews your family history, we confirm that you are who you say you are. This page explains exactly what that step involves, who sees your documents, and what comes back to us - so that nothing about it surprises you when you get there.
A certification that anyone could obtain under any name would be worth nothing. Not to you, and not to the businesses that carry the mark. The identity check is what stands between this registry and someone claiming a lineage that is not theirs.
It also protects you. Your certification is tied to a verified identity, which means nobody else can later claim to be you and trade on the finding you earned.
Identity verification confirms who you are. Lineage verification establishes who you descend from. They are separate processes, done by separate parties, and passing one says nothing about the other. Successful identity verification does not establish that you are a Descendant of U.S. Chattel Slavery, and successful lineage verification does not make you a member or part of the DOUSCS nonprofit organization.
Your identification goes to an independent identity verification provider - not to DOUSCS. This is the single most important thing to understand about this step.
Their system, their rules. Information and documents you provide directly to the verification provider are governed by that provider's terms, privacy practices, and applicable law - not by ours. We would rather say that plainly than let you assume our privacy commitments cover a company we do not control. What happens to your file once it reaches us is covered by our privacy policy.
Five short statements, each acknowledged separately. Not one blanket checkbox. You can stop at any point without having started an application.
A new window opens on their system. You deal with them directly. It usually takes a few minutes.
They tell us your verified legal name and that the check succeeded. Your application continues from where you left it.
We record that verification was completed and on what date. That record - not a copy of your ID - is what sits in your file.
These are shown to you in the application, each with its own checkbox. They are reproduced here in full so you can read them now, without any pressure to click:
Why five checkboxes and not one. A single "I agree" proves you clicked. Five separate acknowledgments mean you were shown each point on its own. If there is ever a dispute about what you were told, the record shows exactly that.
Identity verification is required for Personal Basic and Personal Executive certification, because those are the applications that claim a line of descent traced to an ancestor living in America in 1870. That claim is what the identity check protects.
Community Sponsor applicants do not complete identity verification. A sponsor is not claiming descendant status, so there is no lineage claim to guard. Sponsor certification is assessed on community conduct and legal standing instead.
Business Certification relies on the personal certification already held by the qualifying owner. The owner's identity was verified when they certified as an individual; it is not repeated for each business they own.
