The Risk Factor

So-called “identity theft” results from the obsolete legacy of the 9-digit social security number combined with the dunderhead insistence by private institutions that it be relied on as a personal identifier. 9 digits are not enough to contain any check digits (cf. the 16 digits + expiration date + little code on the back of the card for credit cards) so ANY 9-digit combination is potentially a valid SS#. Then, I remember when I got my SS# in about 1959 - the card had printed right on it "Not to be used for identification." Yet somehow, every financial, medical and governmental institution that I deal with uses that number for identification. They do this even though they have no easy way to check it, and even though I myself have been expressly forbidden to use it for identification.

These, then, are the two main ingredients in a recipe for trouble. To ask the innocent individual to exercise vigilance to prevent "identity theft" (a euphemism for "fraud") is unfair. The whole system is set up in a way that encourages fraud. Then, to burden the victim, who is really more of an innocent bystander than a victim, with cleaning up the institutional mess after fraud has occurred is scandalous and obscene. It is the failure of the institutions to identify people properly in the first place that exposes all normal trusting honest people to predation by crooks. Those flagrantly careless institutions who are defrauded - and somehow the fraud is connected to some innocent person's name - owe it to us to do the cleanup themselves, and compensate us for whatever trouble and cost we incurred as a result of their negligence.

I cannot say it any better than Doug Raymond did. I will add that people who oppose a national identity card and number ignore the folly of using a social security number for everything which as Mr. Raymond pointed out is being done. There is no privacy with a SSN but there is hope that a properly (note the caveat) designed national identity card would reduce the exposure the ordinary citizen has now to identity theft and its problems.

The Feds have done nothing except encourage a SSN as a national identifier.

I'd like to see the IRS start a program of investigating instances of multiple SSNs. And, if they find that any of these SSNs are being used fraudulently, they should prosecute the offenders.

FYI: From the Social Security website, not all SSNs are available to be issued. SSNs starting with "0", "8", and "9" are reserved. Also, no SSNs will be assigned with a "group number" of "00" (xxx-00-xxxx) or a "serial number" of "0000" (xxx-xx-0000). Plus, they try to avoid the sequence "666" anywhere in the number.

There are also online lists which show which group numbers are being currently issued. So, you can't just make up an SSN and expect it to be valid, which is why, of course, the bad guys tend to steal existing SSNs.

[I used to write tax software, so I've run into this before.]

I cannot say it any better than Doug Raymond did. I will add that companies that open accounts without proper identification should be required by law to correct the problems and compensate the person that has been damaged by the identify theft.

Then, just to make one even safer, the government prints your social security number on the front of your Medicare card. Medicare fraud using stolen Medicare cards is on an upslope.

One would think that the one piece of information associated with the SSN would be the date of birth, since social security benefits are tied to age. A minimal check of that piece of information would have indicated fraud for any of the uses that the thief mad of the SSN.

This is just a bit of trivia that I thought was appropriate. The only people with a "need to know" for a person's SSN are: police for tracking criminals, your employer to communicate to the IRS about your earnings, your realtor to report your profits from the sale of your house to the IRS, the IRS to harass us good tax-payers, and the attending physician when you die so that the good doctor can annotate your SSN on your death certificate.

When recently asked by my dentist for my SSN I asked her if she intended to kill me. Fortunately, she shares the same kind of warped humor as me and we both got a chuckle.

Keep in mind: By law, a business cannot refuse services if you refuse to give your social security number.

Also, you may want to take a sharp knife and scratch off the magnetic strip on the back of your driver's license, or state ID. I was told your SSN is stored on it. I don't know how true this is, but being a two-time victim of identity theft, I take no chances.

Christopher - try demagnetizing the stripe rather than physically scratching it off - less work and just as sure. Plus, if the police pull you over and ask for your license it won't look intentionally damaged. It just won't scan when they swipe it.