Brand & Design
What is an EIN?
Employer Identification Number, a nine-digit federal tax ID assigned by the IRS to businesses, nonprofits, and other entities operating in the United States.
Also known as: Employer Identification Number, Federal Tax ID, FEIN
An EIN is the business equivalent of a social security number, formatted as XX-XXXXXXX. The IRS issues one per legal entity at formation; you use it on tax filings, bank account openings, payroll registrations, and most B2B onboarding flows that need to verify a counterparty is a real US business.
EINs are not strictly secret (they appear on W-9 forms and many public filings) but they are also not freely searchable. Public databases exist for nonprofits (the IRS publishes 990 filings) and SEC-registered entities, but for private companies the EIN is something the company has to disclose in a contract or onboarding flow.
For brand-data and KYC use cases, the EIN is the canonical key for tying a website to a legal entity. Combined with NAICS or SIC for industry classification and a verified address, it is the minimum bar for "is this business real and who is it." Brand.dev pulls EINs (where available) as part of company-data enrichment alongside DUNS numbers and ticker symbols.
In the wild
- →A SaaS onboarding form asking for company name and EIN to provision a paid account
- →A KYC pipeline matching the EIN on a W-9 to the EIN in IRS filings before approving an ACH transfer
- →A business-data API returning EIN, NAICS, and address when given a domain
How Brand.dev uses ein
Endpoints in the Brand.dev API where this concept comes up directly.
FAQ
EIN vs DUNS number?
EIN is a US tax ID issued by the IRS. DUNS is a global business identifier issued by Dun & Bradstreet. A US company typically has both; an international supplier may have only a DUNS.
Is an EIN public?
For nonprofits and public companies, yes (via 990 filings and SEC documents). For private companies, the EIN is shared selectively; it is not in a public IRS lookup.
Do sole proprietors have EINs?
They can request one but are not required to: a sole prop can use the owner's SSN. EINs become mandatory once the business has employees, runs payroll, or is taxed as a corporation or partnership.
Related terms
A six-digit industry classification used by US, Canadian, and Mexican government agencies to categorize every business in North America.
The Standard Industrial Classification, a four-digit industry taxonomy used by the SEC and a long tail of legacy systems, predecessor to NAICS.
A nine-digit business identifier issued by Dun & Bradstreet, used globally for credit reporting, government contracting, and supply chain verification.
A short alphabetic code used to uniquely identify a publicly traded security on a stock exchange (e.g., AAPL for Apple, MSFT for Microsoft).