Stripe Atlas Vendor Leaked SSNs

Re:Stripe Atlas Vendor Leaked SSNs by tialaramex on Saturday January 04, 2020 @09:35AM (#21955060)

SSNs are much too short, and were mostly issued in a foolish and predictable way (if you're a kid you might have a random SSN but most Americans still have ones issued the old way). Given the US plausible population load, issuing a randomly chosen 12 digit number incorporating a check digit would have been a better start.

But the authentication problem is the tricky part though, governments don't have a reliable way to authenticate their citizens today and even if you have a good will intent to fix this, that can be hijacked by people with less saintly motives. See India or China for how that might not go well.

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Re:Stripe Atlas Vendor Leaked SSNs by avital on Saturday January 04, 2020 @01:27PM (#21956459)

The Netherlands has a digital government sign-in ("DigID") which works very well, secured using text messaging or 2 factor auth. With it you view all of your official documents across all branches of government. It allows for delegating permissions (say between a married couple). It's really great and shows that with competence these systems work out great.

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Re:Stripe Atlas Vendor Leaked SSNs by kwhitefoot on Saturday January 04, 2020 @07:17PM (#21958672)

> governments don't have a reliable way to authenticate their citizens today

Yours might not but mine (Norway) seems to work quite well.

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