This is an academic demonstration and not fit for any purpose beyond our educational use.

NEITHER HARVARD UNIVERSITY NOR ANY INDIVIDUAL OR ENTITY ASSOCIATED WITH THIS PROJECT MAKES ANY WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, WHETHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, STATUATORY OR OTHERWISE, INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.

1. Matching People and SSNs

   A goal of the SSNwatch project, presented here, is to explore how publicly available information about people and about Social Security numbers (SSNs) can be used to verify whether a given SSN matches the person presenting the SSN, and vice versa. By identifying the state in which the SSN was issued, the date the SSN was issued, the estimated age range of the recipient, and whether the number has been retired from use, we can provide inferences about the person presenting the SSN. This information can then be matched against other information the person provides for consistency. Mismatches in this information can help identify suspicious presentations of SSNs. Perhaps imposters might be exposed. The SSNwatch Validation Service available above provides such information. In future work, we will also provide inferences in the opposite direction, thereby relating information known about a person to what must be true about their SSN.

   We envision our SSNwatch Validation Service as a way to help combat Identity theft. In the United States, SSNs are essential to recognizing the identity of a person in data. SSNs associate people with various types of health, financial, legal, educational, and billing information. It is not surprising therefore, that SSNs are an essential ingredient to most forms of identity theft. Being able to verify that the person presenting an SSN is the person to whom the SSN was assigned may be useful in recognizing false identities presented by employees, tenants, students, and others.

   
   

2. Measuring the Identifiability of SSNs

   Another goal of this SSNwatch project is to determine the identifiability of an SSN in whole or part. Some people believe that releasing only an SSN, in part or whole, cannot be readily re-identified to the person to whom the SSN was issued without access to credit reports or other information containing both the person's SSN and name explicitly. Such a belief may pose privacy risks for those who's SSNs are released. To demonstrate whether this is merely a myth, we begin by understanding how much and what kind of information is revealed about a person when part or all of the person's SSN is shared. The data within the SSNwatch Validation Service provides the basis for such an assessment.

   
   

3. Assessing the Public Availability of SSNs

   A third goal of this SSNwatch project is to assess the public availability of SSNs, along with related risks. The use of SSNs is clearly widespread. Some people argue that SSNs, while available within many financial, health, employment, and government institutions, is still limited. The claim is that SSNs are not generally available to the public. Recent news reports have surfaced relating the ease at which the SSNs of known people can be purchased for less than $30 each. Our goal in this work is to estimate how active SSNs can be obtained for free and to examine the availability of these SSNs for identity theft and the acquisition of fraudulent credit cards.

   
   

4. Developing and Proposing Technical and Policy Solutions

   Another goal of this SSNwatch project is to provide technical integrations, add-ons and stand-alone technology that render uses of SSNs more socially responsible, and to provide policy and legal analyses that examine the effectiveness of these technologies, and to recommend policy accordingly.

The SSNwatch project is part of our Surveillance of Surveillances (SOS) effort.