I think that given all of this information, they could run a very convincing scam either against you, or a service you interact with.

From what I can tell, SSN is still somehow considered a form of identification in the US.

Edit: Commented too early.

As much as WFH is a thing forever, whenever I do high stakes things, they require me to come in + show my drivers license.

Seems like there are basically no exceptions when it comes to banking.

> basically no exceptions when it comes to banking.

That depends on your megabank. KYC and what staff will do over the phone is about relationships. I get things done over the phone at local credit unions and even mid-size regional banks. Banking and identity regulations allow a lot to happen, and your personal relationships make a difference.

The back offices of mega-banks generally prevent personal service. Choose a different banker.

How might someone acquire a drivers license with your name on it? Having your SSN helps a lot!

Are you willing to provide your address and phone number in this thread, then? My guess is "no", but why not? Might other people not want their home address and phone number made public?

When this discussion comes up, I think some people forget the context is online fraud. The attacker likely has other information on you, so a lookup service that helps them stitch it together with your real name and number is not good. The yellow pages is not a lookup service like that, it can't connect you from other information to a name and phone number, so having a book of names unlinked to the data you have gets you nowhere.

People also forget (or may not know, since they post-date the use of print telephone directories) that you could opt out of being in the Yellow Pages. You can't do that with credit headers, or even, practically speaking, with credit cards.

They also forget that it was the White Pages for personal listings, and the Yellow Pages for business listings.

Fair point!

> or even, practically speaking, with credit cards.

Yes you can opt out even with credit cards, and you can also do it for minor children in 5 easy steps: 1 clone your trust document 2 IRS.com and get TIN for trust 3 open trust savings account at bank 4 put funds in account 5 get the bank's 'secured credit card' offer in which they lock the funds

If you quibble that a secured credit card is not a real credit card, then just get the debit card.

Every address you've lived at... frequently this plus a SSN is all you need to completely take over someone's identity.

There are other services which rely on this header’s information for authentication (which of these addresses did you live at in 2021?) so for approximately $15, you can dramatically increase the effectiveness of an attack on those services.

Unlisted numbers have been a white pages paid feature for a very long time. Very similar incentives in both directions compared to these headers, I’m sure. (Yellow pages were pay for inclusion, iirc.)

The criticism here should be that the starting point is 'name & state' (wouldn't 'doxing' normally be determining name/identity or more from believed-anonymous online interactions?) but otherwise yes whatever you think of how important it is that is doxing?

But it's more than you cherry-picked anyway:

> The file included the names and birth years of their relatives. It listed the target’s mobile phone numbers and provider, as well as personal email addresses. Finally, the file contained information from their drivers’ license, including its unique identification number.

Plus 'sometimes' Social Security Number as you said.

> SSN? Haven't we moved beyond SSN for security purposes?

No, the banks haven't, which means you haven't, bucko.

You haven't moved on because of your parents.

SSN is voluntary. If parents would stop opting-in their babies into this data scheme, Americans could grow up without these numbers.

The only thing you are achieving is to add extra paperwork and hassle to your daughter's future when she later has a job or opens a bank account.

We are allowing our children to make their own choices when they are adults. If they want to opt-in to SSN as adults, they will be able to do that. America is eager to let children choose everything including their gender, so why not preserve their SSN choice until they are an adult?

Last week I opened yet another savings account with name roughly "baby girl trust" and the tax ID I got that morning from IRS website for the _trust_. New account setup was super easy because I had everything the credit union wanted for their back office.

I luckily had a lot of free time and motivation to learn this stuff. Most Americans don't know and presume it is therefore not possible.

> SSN is voluntary.

"Voluntary" but required to live like a normal human being isn't very "voluntary" in reality.

Get a job without an SSN.

Employer is required to verify citizen or immigration status. For an American with a passport, the passport works okay.

Passport works great for ID all around, because it does not require SSN and does not have home address.

Many things, like TSA (Soviet era) checkpoints don't actually require ID. People seemingly prefer to act like cattle and show IDs everywhere and voluntarily consent to full body scans. Then people complain that their bits of privacy got leaked. Of course it leaked, and you voluntarily consented.

Elsewhere in this thread you're talking about birth certificates being voluntary (they're not). How are you proving citizenship for your passport without one?

You are going to get a lot of people telling you that you're a libertarian nutjob. Even here, which touts itself as a bastion of internet privacy champions and "experts".

But you, you're walking the walk. Asking the hard questions and accepting the consequences. There is only one way to make things change.

Don't let any little pedants tell you "how your daughter is going to grow up", either. Or that they somehow know how she'll feel about you.

FWIW: my kids have SSN's and that is just as dangerous as what you've chose.

Yes, the big brain types sometimes get really pissed off when they find out they were tricked into voluntarily consenting into a bunch of stuff.

When you get/renew passports, leave the SSN box blank. It will become second nature to ignore these data requests.

> You are going to get a lot of people telling you that you're a libertarian nutjob.

No, just making life more difficult for his child, who has no say in the matter.

Some people are bad at seeing children as humans, as opposed to appendages of the parent.

Do you see the irony in your first statement?

Or have you already resolved to believe that person is your "some people"?

The only thing you are achieving is to add extra paperwork and hassle to your daughter's future when she later has a job or opens a bank account.

Honestly, the shortest solution to these problems would be to reshape the law so that banks are 100% responsible for fraud. As in, if they open an account tied to somebody and it turns out to be tied to somebody else? 100% on them, the person who they were deceived into believing they were doing business with is fully protected by the law from any ramifications.

Of course, this would completely change the risk model banks operate under and fundamentally reshape commerce as we know it. Thanks would become hypersensitive, all business would be conducted in person, banks would reserve the right to tie up your money for years if you couldn't prove who you were (think getting your Google account unlocked when Google suspects fraud, except now it's your money in the bank down the street...).

> Home address and phone number?!?! The horror! (Did people forget yellow pages existed?)

Are you absolutely sure that people who had real concerns about their privacy and safety allowed their phone number and address to be published in the book? Also, it was the White Pages, btw.