One news item that probably escaped your attention — and who could blame you as many things as are going on in the world — is that a coalition of industry, government, and academic experts are forming a center whose purpose is to study and come up with ways to prevent identity theft. Identity theft is a serious problem. Here’s what the federal government has to say about it. As we speak, legislation is circulating around the Senate and House that — although it would not prevent identity theft at all — would at least attempt to create uniform guidelines about what financial institutions would have to do in the event that consumer data is compromised. Some experts opine that many problems could be avoided if common sense were more common.
Here’s a radical thought: let’s start preventing identity theft by agreeing not to pass financial information around like mashed potatoes at Sunday Dinner!
We can start by not putting Social Security Numbers on documents such as health insurance cards and school ID cards. We can continue by not putting Social Security Numbers in state driver’s license records. Let’s limit access to Social Security Numbers to entities who have a legitimate tax, credit, or financial reason to know. Your boss needs your Social Security Number so he can pay the taxes associated with your employment. Your High School has no legitimate reason to know your Social Security Number. Your college might need it if you receive student aid, but your professors don’t need it.
Then let’s have a long hard look at the sorts of data corporate America has. Some of it they have — legitimately — because of doing business with you. Some of it they have because they bought or “shared” it with another business. And some of that data is in turn bought or shared from yet a third or fourth or fiftieth business. Company A might know you own a microwave oven made by Company B, purchased at Company C, through a data purchased from Company D, but what business is it of theirs? I mean really. Why do they need to know? And are the big data warehouses of aggregated consumer information really a benefit to real people? Or are they just a way for corporate America to sell us more stuff and have more information about us? Such databases are already being used by law enforcement to get around petty little things like search warrants. Not surprisingly, they are also being used by criminals to find targets.
Maybe then we can deal with computer security, and seriously ask companies why Social Security Numbers would ever be kept on a laptop computer, and why a computer with such information would ever be allowed off the premises. Yes, those are all different instances. I guess it’s hard to learn from the mistakes of others.
In closing, The President calls the press a tattle-tale for daring to say things that are unflattering but true. Wisely, he doesn’t look in his own back yard.
uh… Just how big is a cubit?
And when it was first passed, they promised that people’s social security numbers would never be used for identification. I got my number when I got my job. Now, numbers are assigned at birth.
Granny,
My parents told me that. In fact, I had been led to beleive it was actually part of the Social Security law. Unfortunately, when I looked it up, I found that was not the case. The sad moral of the story is “the law is what politicians write, not what they say.”
And thanks for reading/commenting, Granny!
Thirty years ago my husband was responsible
for setting up a computer program to prepare
the payroll for a company of some 100
employees. One of the tasks was to assign
’employee numbers’ for each person. When
he asked the owner of the company if they
could use Social Seccurity numbers he
was told that it was unlawful to do so.
Where have we gone so very wrong???