Comment by iaresee | Hacker News Reader

Comment by iaresee | Hacker News Reader

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I've only been in the USA for less than a decade but when I landed here and got my SSN I got a pretty good lecture at the window from the Federal worker about never giving this out, keep it safe, yadda, yadda, yadda...

...and was then asked at every turn, by every website and application and whatnot, to provide four or more digits of this number to accomplish even the most benign things.

There's what the US government thought it would be and then there's what it's become because zero enforcement on use of it as a national person identity number was ever enacted.

The "don't give anyone your SSN" trope has become one of those household jokes. Right up there with "American's don't pay high taxes".

And those 4 numbers that they always ask for are the only part of the SSN that isn't procedurally generated from public information.

This isn't true anymore. (Although for most adults, it doesn't matter as they got their SSN before it changed.)

> On June 25, 2011, the SSA changed the SSN assignment process to "SSN randomization". SSN randomization affected the SSN assignment process in the following ways:

> 1. It eliminated the geographical significance of the first three digits of the SSN, referred to as the area number, by no longer allocating specific numbers by state for assignment to individuals.

> 2. It eliminated the significance of the highest group number assigned for each area number, and, as a result, the High Group List is frozen in time and can be used for validation of only those SSNs issued prior to the randomization implementation date (see section "Valid SSNs").

> 3. Previously unassigned area numbers have been introduced for assignment, excluding area numbers 000, 666 and 900–999. [1]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Security_number#Structu...

That's great for 9 year olds. But for the people it matters for now, these points don't apply.

OP already acknowledged this: "for most adults, it doesn't matter as they got their SSN before it changed"

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