For 20 Million Americans, One Social Security Number's Not Enough

Over 20 million Americans have more than a single social security number associated with their names.

How did that happen? Chalk it up to a combination of fraud and human errors.

"The majority of these cases are likely due to data entry errors which occur somewhere along the food chain of these credit applications and then they propagate in the system," according to Stephen Coggeshall, chief technology officer, ID Analytics, the consumer risk management company, which published a recent study disclosing its findings. Among other things, ID Analytics found the following:

• 6.1 percent of Americans have at least two SSNs
• More than 100,000 Americans have five or more SSNs
• More than 15 percent of SSNs are associated with two or more people
• More than 140,000 SSNs are associated with five or more people
• More than 27,000 SSNs are associated with 10 or more people

Fraud accounts for about 15% to 20% of the total, where applicants deliberately provide the wrong social security number. But Coggeshall noted that human errors during the course of the credit-granting process account for most of the screw-ups. "Let's say that you apply to a company and the person on the telephone incorrectly enters the number incorrectly, that problem will be associated with the person whose number they entered incorrectly," Coggeshall said. "These kinds of errors tend to be cumulative; once they happen, they tend to stick."

Update: A spokesman for the Social Security Administration emailed a prepared statement to CBSNews.com, noting that "as other entities use the SSN for purposes beyond what it was created for, problems like those indicated in the report are going to happen.??"

[bobo42813]

Heck, our President has about thirteen of them. So why can't we all have dozens??

[angelinacg02]

I agree with your thought.thank you for sharing it.
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[longtree-2009]

those 20 million will hit the wall when they have to register for medicare or apply for ss benefits.

[gruven13777]

The most cases of identity theft and identity fraud are committed by illegal aliens.

[IndiasWorstTechSupport]

Umm...nope. In almost every major case, an american citizen is most likely behind the schemes. The illegals are just the minions. Besides, who do you think inputs the data in the companies when you apply for a cc? An illegal? In order for something like that to occur you have to have an inside person that's educated and knowledgable with the financial industry. And, the last time I checked they don't hire illegals.

[rf35]

The last one I talked to had a very thick Indian accent. Why hire illegals when you can outsource to India? Similar savings and no laws broken. Some even speak better English than the illegals.

[freechoice4all]

no that is not what they said idiot! ...credit agencies and like orginizations that you may apply for jobs, credit, loans, etc, etc when they enter your info into the system if they do it wrong it may stay in the system (as the wrong wrong number) under your name. thus giving you multiple SSN's.

Work on your reading and compreheension skills so you can understand these articles. ...The mind is a terrible thing to waste and your is being wasted!!!

[imthaid]

You appear to be replying to nobody in particular. Perhaps you need to work on your posting comprehension skills. An attitude is a terrible thing to waste.

[rf35]

imthaid, if you couldn't figure out that the post was in response to tsigili, maybe you need some "posting comprehension" skills of your own.

[Myopinion046]

I have one.

[tsigili]

What you are saying, is the government never gets anything right!

[jumkey]

Shut up.