Old documents and the big identity theft threat

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  1

  Zorched

  11/09/09 | Report as spam

  The SS number disappeared

  Because the use of said number as account identifiers was made illegal, and for the very reason you state in the article. Too many people's identities were being stolen off of older paperwork that was simply thrown away.
  
  If you dumpster dived or green-dived (recycling bin) in my garbage you wouldn't even know who it belongs to. I've shredded everything with a name, account number, personal identifier or my address for over a dozen years. It takes me about a two seconds to tear the addressee section off each piece of my mail for shredding and the rest gets recycled. It started when I saw a company dumping old paperwork in a dumpster and realizing that once it's in the garbage, it's free domain, and thus my garbage was the same. People thought I was crazy at the time, but I guess now I've been proven right.
  
  No one should put any identifiable material in the trash anymore.
  
  I don't know when our society stopped listening to that little "I shouldn't do that" voice, but that little guy/girl has been bound, gagged, and tossed in the garbage with the rest of our common courtesies lately.

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  2

  jmd8421r

  11/09/09 | Report as spam

  RE: Old documents and the big identity theft threat

  By Law most paperwork cannot have your SSN any longer. That is good. Of course the "government" exempted itself. On my Medicare care, which I need to carry in case I need care, there is that number in big bold type.

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  3

  aa3805@...

  11/09/09 | Report as spam

  RE: Old documents and the big identity theft threat

  I had a bunch of documents from my father-in-law to deal with. I buried them in the garden. In a month or two, they'll disintegrate and improve my soil.

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  4

  ronangel

  11/09/09 | Report as spam

  RE: Old documents and the big identity theft threat

  never had ss number on any but official government documents in uk so no problem.not used in credit or banking transactions only for taxes.
  If somebody else uses number at same time as you will show up on system so not a good idea.some low paid council or hospital cleaners
  make the news paper now and then for fraudulently claiming ss while working.that is about it.

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  5

  JTF243@...

  11/09/09 | Report as spam

  RE: Old documents and the big identity theft threat

  Despite the fact that it has been illegal to use the SS number "for identification purposes",
  guess what my college ID number was!
  Like Zorched, everything with an address gets shredded, even if it if for "Occupant".

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  6

  btompkins@...

  11/11/09 | Report as spam

  RE: Old documents and the big identity theft threat

  When I was in the Navy, I remember being in a hanger waiting to go to my next duty station looking at literally hundreds of seabags with full names and social security numbers printed on them.
  
  The sad part is, once someone else/anyone else has your social security number, there is nothing you can do about it and it is nearly impossible to get a new social security number.
  
  Most of us will be the victim of some type of identity theft at some point in our lives. Because of an archaic draconian method of tracking who we are.
  
  

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  7

  Xnert

  11/28/09 | Report as spam

  RE: Old documents and the big identity theft threat

  Most companies were never supposed to use your Social Security Number for identification anyway -- that piece of information was supposed to be between you and the Federal (and MAYBE your State) government, ONLY -- in short, only those entities that needed to interact with your Federal tax records. Nonetheless, everybody from department stores to pizza delivery outfits would constantly ask for it and go into all sorts of conniptions if -- as I learned around 1980 to do -- you cited the Privacy Act of 1974 and REFUSED to give them your SSN. Unfortunately, one gets tired of having to "raise a big stink" every time one wants to make a transaction or open a department-store charge account or what-have-you, and so as a nation we all got lazy (and let our children grow up lazy) and simply handed out our SSN whenever asked. So to some extent it's our own individual faults that our SSNs were sprayed everywhere -- we did nothing to prevent it -- but also it's the fault of all those companies that had no reason to use our SSN but insisted on using it anyway. I say, collect records of who these companies were, and make THEM pay at least 50% of the costs of fighting identity theft, recovering stolen identity, and changing business practices NOT to use the SSN indiscriminately.