<story><title>DOJ: Hackers broke into an SEC database and made millions from inside info</title><url>https://www.cnbc.com/2019/01/15/international-stock-trading-scheme-hacked-into-sec-database-justice-dept-says.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>aboutruby</author><text>And yet many services rely on SSN for identity verification in the US (e.g. banks, telecoms, etc.)</text></item><item><author>wtvanhest</author><text>IMO, everyone&amp;#x27;s SSN should be public.  Mine has already be compromised by both my undergrad and grad school.  At this point, I operate under the assumption that it is public knowledge for bad actors.&lt;p&gt;Hiding SSNs is false security at best. If they were public, banks would stop hiding behind &amp;quot;identity theft&amp;quot; and would start having to acknowledge that its their responsibility to confirm who they are lending money to.</text></item><item><author>JumpCrisscross</author><text>&amp;gt; &lt;i&gt;The New York Stock Exchange has asked the SEC to consider limiting the amount of data collected by the CAT, which would include data on around 58 billion daily trades, as well as the personal details of individuals making the trades, including their Social Security numbers and dates of birth&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;Dropping SSNs for natural persons would be a good idea.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>briffle</author><text>that is what wtvanhest is talking about. If everyone has your social, its no longer considered a secret (like a password) its more like a unique identifier (an email address) just like it was intended to be.</text></comment>
<story><title>DOJ: Hackers broke into an SEC database and made millions from inside info</title><url>https://www.cnbc.com/2019/01/15/international-stock-trading-scheme-hacked-into-sec-database-justice-dept-says.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>aboutruby</author><text>And yet many services rely on SSN for identity verification in the US (e.g. banks, telecoms, etc.)</text></item><item><author>wtvanhest</author><text>IMO, everyone&amp;#x27;s SSN should be public.  Mine has already be compromised by both my undergrad and grad school.  At this point, I operate under the assumption that it is public knowledge for bad actors.&lt;p&gt;Hiding SSNs is false security at best. If they were public, banks would stop hiding behind &amp;quot;identity theft&amp;quot; and would start having to acknowledge that its their responsibility to confirm who they are lending money to.</text></item><item><author>JumpCrisscross</author><text>&amp;gt; &lt;i&gt;The New York Stock Exchange has asked the SEC to consider limiting the amount of data collected by the CAT, which would include data on around 58 billion daily trades, as well as the personal details of individuals making the trades, including their Social Security numbers and dates of birth&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;Dropping SSNs for natural persons would be a good idea.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>gtirloni</author><text>You mean they rely &lt;i&gt;solely&lt;/i&gt; on someone dictating a SSN number? That&amp;#x27;s insane. They should ask for a official ID with photo, as the very minimum.&lt;p&gt;Is that something that goes against the American culture? The other day I had to give all 10 fingerprints to renew my driver&amp;#x27;s license (location: South America) and nobody seemed to care.</text></comment>