We're always being asked for our SSN

Sadie5

Our little town's public library started a policy where to continue to borrow books we had to provide a copy of our driver's license. I refused saying if they wanted to see my DL each time I borrowed some books to prove my ID but I wasn't going to have a copy of my DL somewhere in there files where who knows who has access to them.

Now they come up with another policy where you have to list your SSN, provide a photograph to be put on file in order to take out books. This includes children too. I let them know that we have borrowed books for almost 20 years and have always returned them. With this new policy in place, we will stop borrowing books. Giving out all this private info is just now worth it.

We took one of our children to a new doctor. They wanted the child's SSN as well as one of ours. We refused to give either. They still took us a patients.

Why are they wanting more and more info all the time? anyone else run into this?

Sadie

Elsewhere

I think they are trying to find terrorists... you know... the 6 year-old type.

I defy any authority to show me how many terrorists they have caught by violating the privacy of the masses. ZERO.

ohiocowboy

Just another way for "BIG BROTHER" to keep track of our lives and routines. I notice more and more daily routines having to give up personal information, many times by the way of SSN., DL number, and Credit card number.

weasel

One of the sad facts are all they need to know is your name and address and through the Internet they can find out ANYTHING about you. Driving record, drivers license number, credit card purchases, employment, criminal history, public records, credit history, SSN to name a few.

I can do about 80% of it at my desk and I don't even have access to the main data bases. Sad but true.........

The Weeze

gespro

Maybe it's our new freedoms at work

wasasister

I work in the health care industry. Please don't blame the medical people who ask for your SSN. Some older computer database programs are set up to identify individuals by using the SSN, since many people share a common name or even birthdate. Also, most insurance companies still use SSN in order to identify subscribers.

When a patient declines to supply me with their SSN, I simply request that they pay for their visit at time of service and they can submit their own claims for direct reimbursement. (This usally changes the person's mind, BTW.) To get around the software problems, a fake number can be used: 000-11-9999. As long as the person doesn't owe me money, I could care less what their SSN is.

Anyone in the healthcare field knows they must lock up, shred, or otherwise protect your personal information. There are significant fines for not doing so.

In the case of the library, you could offer to use another system of identification for security purposes such as a thumb-print.

Wasa