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Can Social Security Numbers Be Guessed?

Researchers Find Public Information Helps Crack Code

AOL News

posted: 4 HOURS 17 MINUTES AGO

comments: 119

filed under: National News

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(July 7) -- Public information such as a person's date and place of birth provide clues to most, if not all, of a person's nine-digit Social Security number, according to a new study by researchers at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh.

The finding, published Monday in The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, is getting lots of news coverage because so many parts of the public and private sectors use Social Security numbers as proof of identity.

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The first five digits of a Social Security number can be determined fairly easily by birth information and other data that's available to the public, a study says.

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The predictability of the way the numbers are assigned "exposes them to risks of identity theft on mass scales," study authors Alessandro Acquisti and Ralph Gross wrote. Acquisti is an associate professor of information technology and public policy; Gross is a postdoctoral researcher.

The first three digits of a Social Security number, known as the area number, are determined by ZIP code. The middle two numbers, called the group number, are assigned within a region and may remain the same for years. Lists of assigned area and group numbers are available through Web sites associated with the Social Security Administration, the report said.

The last for digits, called the serial number, are assigned to people in sequence.

The report found that obtaining the Social Security numbers of deceased people through death records can help narrow down possible Social Security numbers for people born around the same time who are still alive.

Predicting the numbers for people born after 1988 is easier because that's when the government began promoting efforts to assign numbers shortly after birth, the report found. It's also easier to guess the numbers of people born in small states.

How did the Social Security Administration respond to the report? A spokesman told The Washington Post that the agency has long cautioned against using the number as an identifier, but it also maintained that there is no sure-fire way to figure out a particular person's number.

The spokesman, Mark Lassiter, also told The Post that the agency is working on a system to randomly assign Social Security numbers, making them more difficult to guess.

"This report is a wake-up call," Peter Swire, the Clinton administration's chief privacy counselor, told The New York Times. "Social Security numbers are an aging technology, and we have to do serious planning for what will come next."

2009-07-07 09:31:34

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DShovelhead66

04:37 PMJul 07 2009

KZ10244 03:56 PMJul 07 2009 ...Subject: Is Anyone Minding the Store? s>>>>>Your comment is off subject, but I appreciated the link to this video. Everyone who is concerned about where their tax money is going or NOT should view this and send it to their email contacts.

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HowardOst

04:33 PMJul 07 2009

Okay if you take the time to actually read the published article you'll find that the synopsis is flat out wrong. The ability to predict SSN's varies greatly. For example in California the match for the first 5 number was less than 2% for births in 1980. The highest reported was 90% for Vermont for births in 1995. The assumes that the last numbers can be deduced from other sources (these other sources was rather vague).

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ph9teen53404

04:25 PMJul 07 2009

My name is Paul Hunter, and I am the 19th child out of 21 natural children. Yes, my mother is the mother of 21 natural children(18 living today) 61 grandchildren, and 55 great-grandchildren. www.hunterfamily21.com share this story with your friends.

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HowardOst

04:23 PMJul 07 2009

I'd like to see this done. In other words I dare the people who claim that they can do to guess my SSN

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CCF461

04:23 PMJul 07 2009

Yea, Thanks AOL. You stupid idiots! They print anything with out thinking about who it hurts. AH's

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DShovelhead66

04:16 PMJul 07 2009

Yeah, congrat's to AOL for publishing this info" IDIOTS!

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Carverhennepin

04:11 PMJul 07 2009

This is "made up" news. They wonder why they are sucking wind. This crap wouldn't get published in a high school newspaper. I think the news editors at AOL are trying to make AOL go bankrupt. There is no other reason for this crap.

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Jetta8300

04:09 PMJul 07 2009

Way to go AOLNEWS for advertising this for the world to see.

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SassyLil14u

04:02 PMJul 07 2009

I can believe this. My brother and I were born 1 year, one month and 3 days apart from each other and our SSN's are are only 2 numbers different. The last 4 digits, say mine was 4222, his would be 4702 otherwise they are all the same.

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SMBURWICK

03:58 PMJul 07 2009

Everybody call 202-224-3121 in Washington to your senators and congressmen, to have them support the Republic of Honduras against the intervention of Obama into the constitutional government of Honduras. Zelaya is a socialist like Chavez and was outed because of their constitution. Naturally, Obama-socialist, marxist wants the socialist back to kiss the butt of Chavez. CALL WASHINGTON TODAY! People have to have a voice!

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