From: palmer@icat.larc.nasa.gov (Michael T. Palmer)
Newsgroups: alt.privacy
Subject: Thieves have your number (SSN as DL in VA)
Date: 22 Dec 1992 18:24:50 GMT
Organization: NASA Langley Research Center, Hampton, VA  USA
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: icat.larc.nasa.gov
Originator: palmer@icat.larc.nasa.gov

This article appeared in the Sunday, December 13, 1992 edition of the
Hampton, Virginia Daily Press.  Everyone who lives in a state where SSN is
used as the driver's license number is encouraged to get a reprint of
this article (say, from your local library or something) and send it to
their state legislators.  Let them know that you expect the state to
quit making it so easy for criminals to commit fraud and wreak havoc with
the lives of their (voting) constituents.  Tell your friends and coworkers
to do the same.  PLEASE!

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                        THIEVES HAVE YOUR NUMBER
      Social Security I.D. provides easy access to computer records

                             By David Ress
                              Daily Press

                        Sunday, December 13, 1992
                      Reprinted without permission


   Want to learn some secrets?

   Take a close look next time someone writes a check.

   Most folks flash their drivers' licenses to prove their identity when
paying by check.  In Virginia, the number on a driver's license is a
person's Social Security number.

   And that number is the key to a series of computer databases that can
give someone access - with relatively little effort - to everything from
one's credit report to medical and arrest records to information on what
kind of things the person buys.

   Kathy Counts, of Virginia Beach, found out the hard way.

   When she tried to refinance her home mortgage this year, her credit
report sent alarm bells ringing at the bank.

   And when she tried to sort it out, she told Congress earlier this year,
she found someone had used her name and Social Security number to set up 11
phony credit accounts in her name, running up big bills that weren't being
paid.

   The person who did it was a Social Security Administration employee who
has since resigned.

   She said it took her most of this year to clean up the mess.

   Two years ago, Newport News welder Timothy Evans discovered that a car
salesman used Evans' Social Security number to take out more than $18,000
of loans in Evans' name.  The salesman, who got hold of Evans' number and
other personal information while discussing a car deal that fell through,
also used Evans' number to bounce checks and run up a $3,900 tab at Sears.
It took more than six months to sort out the mess and restore his credit
record.

   Robert J. Stratton, a Herndon consultant who designs computer security
systems, said medical, criminal, and a wide variety of commercial records
- what people buy, how much they spend, where they live - are also arranged
by Social Security number.

   And one of the most common ways that the private databases get hold of
those numbers is by taking note of drivers' licenses used to validate the
identity of a check-writer, he said.

   An ad hoc subcommittee of the House of Delegates' Courts of Justice
and its Corporation, Insurance and Banking committees is considering
drafting legislation to remove Social Security numbers from drivers'
licenses and possibly to set up a board to monitor how such personal
information is safeguarded in computer databases.

   Computer experts like Stratton, along with civil libertarians and
consumer activists have been pushing for such changes.

   The State Police see little value in having Social Security numbers on
licenses, but the Department of Motor Vehicles is concerned about the cost
of an accelerated program to remove the numbers.  Officials say they could
phase in a new numbering system at a fairly low cost by phasing it in as
people renew their licenses.

   Stratton said the cost of keeping the numbers on licenses is high.
"You're giving out a unique key to every person who you do business with,
with every check you write," he said.

   Walter Ayers, executive director of the Virginia Bankers Association,
said bankers are concerned that criminals are getting hold of other
peoples' Social Security numbers and using them in frauds.  Getting hold
of other peoples' numbers is often a vital part of schemes to get credit
fraudulently or to set up dummy bank accounts for bad check fraud schemes.

  A faked I.D. and a rattled-off Social Security number is all that's 
needed for such a fraud.  Bankers and lenders don't always ask to see
Social Security cards.

   The records of the way that criminals handle credit or bounce checks
they obtain fraudulently often are stored on the basis of the Social
Security number they used, Stratton said.

   Until the 1970s, Social Security cards used to say they couldn't be
used for identification.  However, in the 1990s, the card numbers are
routinely used that way.

   One problem with that is that Social Security numbers aren't very good
identification.

   Unlike credit-card numbers or drivers' license numbers in states like
Maryland, Social Security numbers provide no built-in way of checking their
validity, Stratton said.

   Credit-card numbers usually include a couple of digits that can be
calculated from the rest of the digits - for instance, by adding up every
other digit.  If someone misreads a number, or tries to buy something with
a made-up credit card number, the check digits signal that something is
wrong.

   Stratton and other records management experts say there is no way of
validating a Social Security number.

   "It is the least reliable identifier in our society," said R. Lewis Vass,
assistant records manager for the State Police.

   The State Police use identification codes based on a person's full name,
age, sex, race and residence.  In Maryland and several other states, the
departments of motor vehicles use code numbers based on the sound of a
person's surname and other personal information.  Those numbers incorporate
self-validating check digits.

   Vass said he's seen people who have used up to 15 Social Security numbers
for identification - many of which were assigned to someone else.

   Sometimes that happens when a criminal makes up a Social Security number.
Sometimes, the government makes a mistake.

   State Election Board Secretary Michael Brown said the agency has
occasionally run across cases where the Social Security Administration
inadvertently assigned the same number to two people.

   He told a special General Assembly committee earlier this month that
the board is now trying to sort out one such case, but gave no further
details.

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-- 
Michael T. Palmer, M/S 152, NASA Langley Research Center, Hampton, VA 23681
Voice: 804-864-2044,   FAX: 804-864-7793,   Email: m.t.palmer@larc.nasa.gov
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