Social Security Numbers and Identity Theft

When the original Social Security law was passed in 1933, it was solely and entirely for the purpose of providing a system by means of which individuals could be taxed and the money used solely for retirement benefits.   When Medicare became law much later, the same number was used as the funds for Medicare were also fixed and earmarked for the benefit of individual taxpayers.  There was much opposition to the use of this number as some sort of national identification number, and as a result, up until 1975 each Social Security card carried the words "Not for identification".  The card had no biometric information or photograph since it was not to be used for identification.

The following quote spells out what the government did with their own regulation:
"In the United States, a Social Security number (SSN) is a nine-digit number issued to U.S. citizens, permanent residents, and temporary (working) residents under section 205(c)(2) of the Social Security Act, codified as 42 U.S.C. § 405(c)(2). The number is issued to an individual by the Social Security Administration, an independent agency of the United States government. Although its primary purpose is to track individuals for Social Security purposes,^[1] the Social Security number has become a de facto national identification number for taxation and other purposes.^[2] "  (The above quote is from Wikipedia).

With the increasing use of electronic storage and communication, the SSN has become more and more vulnerable to identity theft.  We have to begin assuming that if data is online, it is ultimately available to anyone willing to expend the time and effort.  Note that whatever encryption is used, it is breakable.  Therefore, by its misuse of the SSN for identification purposes, the federal government  has exposed us to the ever-increasing risks of identity theft.

It seems absolutely clear that a different system of identification must be used, and developed for use NOW.  If it's encoded, it's breakable.  The only unbreakable code system (at least for the present) would be a biometric system.  We need to replace SSNs with fingerprints and/or retinal scans and/or facial recognition.  Fingerprint scanners are cheap and can be placed on every computerc, ATM, and terminal in the world.  Every bank (who of course now use SSNs for identification) should require such biometric data.

Organizations, whether private or governmental, should be held liable for any damage caused by their use of encoding/breakable systems.  There is no reason to continue a system basically flawed and vulnerable, when it can easily be replaced.  Perhaps we should be thinking about what remedies could be taken to improve the system immediately, especially if the government is reluctant to act.