Data breach: DOGE 'accidentally' leaked the whole Social Security database [pdf]

Re:Data breach: DOGE 'accidentally' leaked the whole Social ... by nerdsniper on Thursday February 05, 2026 @07:26AM (#46898886)

It's used for all sorts of "prove you are who you are" situations. It's most commonly associated with applying for credit/loans, and taxes, but definitely not limited to those things. It's ridiculous that an immutable 8-digit number + name is used for authentication in the USA. It even says on the card "FOR SOCIAL SECURITY AND TAX PURPOSES - NOT FOR IDENTIFICATION" but apparently we've all lost our minds and ignore that. It can be very difficult to go through business processes if you refuse to give your SSN - some healthcare providers will just refuse to serve you.

With it, people can take out loans in your name, get into your accounts, file fake tax returns and get tax refunds in your name, and generally act as if they're you. Things are getting a little better nowadays (with additional information required) but we still don't have a secure method of identification online / over the phone.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Data breach: DOGE 'accidentally' leaked the whole Social ... by ants_a on Thursday February 05, 2026 @07:35AM (#46898956)

Over here we use a PKI cert for that. A smartcard providing the root of that trust is provided by the government after verifying your identity using the typical stuff used for identity documents (any biometric data on file, birth certificate, etc.). That still doesn't mean that it's impossible to steal an identity, or acquire a made up one, but it does make it a whole lot harder.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Data breach: DOGE 'accidentally' leaked the whole Social ... by nemomarx on Thursday February 05, 2026 @07:40AM (#46899003)

The thing about social security is that it was supposed to be used for a fairly narrow system, and the physical cards even have text like "not to be used as identification" on them. And then we used it for that anyway

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Data breach: DOGE 'accidentally' leaked the whole Social ... by namibj on Thursday February 05, 2026 @07:54AM (#46899105)

The German equivalent to the SSN in it's ubiquity, the "federal tax id", is illegal to use for non-tax purposes.

As a German that feels about correct.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Data breach: DOGE 'accidentally' leaked the whole Social ... by salawat on Thursday February 05, 2026 @09:35AM (#46900075)

SSN is technically the same. The Social Security Act, actually has that point explicitly called out. Did anyone listen? Nope.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Data breach: DOGE 'accidentally' leaked the whole Social ... by namibj on Thursday February 05, 2026 @02:40PM (#46904046)

Do they have penalties in the 5+ digits for each such offense?

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Data breach: DOGE 'accidentally' leaked the whole Social ... by salawat on Saturday February 07, 2026 @02:46PM (#46927033)

Wouldn't matter. No one is interested in enforcing it, and there is too much value in the datapoint to credit rating agencies to tear the entire edifice down. Hell, back in 2011, I was part of a group migrating away from SSN usage at the Federal level. The biggest delay? Waiting for another semantically compatible I'd to manifest. TIN (taxpayer identification number) could be synthetically combined with a couple other ID's in the dataset such that they could finally retire the SSN's we weren't supposed to be using in the first place.

[ Parent | on HN ]