Social Security agency leaks thousands of SSNs every year, report says

 http://ow.ly/6YgKh

An article by Jaikumar Vijayan posted on the infoworld.com website on the security central webpage.

This article discusses the fact that approximately 14,000 social security numbers each year are mistakenly entered into the "Death Master File" each year due to errant keystroke entry.

The article states, "Since 1980, when the SSA first started making the file publicly available, more than 400,000 SSNs belonging to living Americans may have been inadvertently published in the Death Master File as a result of the errors, according to the report." In addition, the article states "For its report, Scripps Howard reviewed three files from the Death Master File and discovered 31,931 living Americans listed erroneously in them. Dozens of those who were incorrectly listed were later contacted by the news service. None said they'd been informed of the breach by the SSA.

The SSA has admitted that it inadvertently lists about 14,000 living people in the Death Master File each year, Scripps Howard said."