And your tax records from the IRS, your student loan information from the Education Dept. and much, much more.
Jake Johnson for Common Dreams
"There is no way to overstate how serious a breach this
is. And my understanding is that it has already occurred," said Nancy
Altman, president of Social Security Works, a progressive
advocacy organization that warned late Monday that "Elon
Musk is stealing your personal Social Security data."
The Washington Post and other outlets reported Monday
that Michelle King, a veteran of the Social Security Administration (SSA), left
her position over the weekend after clashing with members of Musk's Department of Government Efficiency, an
advisory commission known as DOGE that
President Donald Trump has unleashed on federal agencies.
The New York Times reported that
King stepped down after Musk's cronies sought access to "an internal data
repository that contains extensive personal information about Americans."
In King's place Trump installed Leland Dudek, described by
the Post as a "manager in charge of Social Security's
anti-fraud office," to lead the Social Security agency until a permanent
commissioner is confirmed. SSA administers retirement benefits and Supplemental
Security Income (SSI) for tens of millions of Americans.
Max Richtman, president and CEO of the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare, said in a statement that "there is no justifiable reason for Musk and DOGE to have access to Americans' deeply personal information."
"Seniors, people with disabilities, and Americans
everywhere of good conscience should be on high alert," said Richtman.
"When a dedicated public servant resigns after more than 30 years due to
the intrusive activities of Elon Musk and DOGE, that truly is a 'canary in a
coal mine' moment."
Altman noted Monday
that SSA "has data on everyone who has a Social Security number, which is
virtually all Americans, everyone who has Medicare, and every low-income
American who has applied for" SSI.
"SSA has comprehensive medical records of people who
have applied for disability benefits. It has our bank information, our earnings
records, the names and ages of our children, and much more," said Altman.
"Older people are disproportionately susceptible to scams. The data at SSA
leaking would make the number of scams skyrocket. And, if there is an intent to
punish perceived enemies, someone could erase your earnings record, making it
impossible to collect the Social Security and Medicare benefits you have
earned."
Altman told The Associated
Press that "if there is an evil intent to punish perceived
enemies, someone could erase your earnings record, making it impossible to
collect the Social Security and Medicare benefits you have earned."
Musk's team of dozens of staffers—many of whose identities
are not publicly known—have infiltrated departments across the federal
government with the stated goal of rooting out waste
and fraud, which critics say is merely a pretext for gutting
critical programs that Trump and the unelected billionaire oppose. On Monday,
advocacy groups filed an emergency lawsuit aiming
to stop DOGE from accessing taxpayer data from the Internal Revenue Service.
"Hundreds of millions of Americans across the nation
file taxes and provide sensitive, personal information to the IRS and they do
so knowing that Congress has put in place protections to safeguard their data.
DOGE is taking a wrecking ball to these protections and harming hardworking
Americans and small businesses in the process," said Skye Perryman,
president and CEO of Democracy Forward. "DOGE must not be permitted to
trample on the American people's rights and that is why we are honored to
represent our clients in this federal court challenge to put a stop to DOGE's
lawless and harmful activities."
Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office last week, Musk
claimed without evidence that his team uncovered "crazy things" in a
"cursory examination of Social Security."
Wired reported that
"computer programmers quickly claimed that the 150 figure was not evidence
of fraud, but rather the result of a weird quirk of the Social Security
Administration's benefits system, which was largely written in COBOL, a 60-year-old programming
language that undergirds SSA's databases as well as systems
from many other U.S. government agencies."
"Because COBOL does not have a date type, some
implementations rely instead on a system whereby all dates are coded to a reference point. The most
commonly used is May 20, 1875, as this
was the date of an international standards-setting conference held in Paris,
known as the 'Convention du Mètre,'" Wired explained.
"These systems default to the reference point when a birth date is missing
or incomplete, meaning all of those entries in 2025 would show an age of
150."
"That's just one possible explanation for what DOGE
allegedly found," the outlet added. "Musk could also have simply
looked up the SSA's own website, which explains that since September 2015 the
agency has automatically stopped benefit payments when anyone reaches the age of 115."
Martin O'Malley, the former governor of Maryland who served
as SSA commissioner under the Biden administration, told the Post that
Musk's team "will break" the Social Security system if they're given
unfettered access.
"They will break it fast," O'Malley warned,
"and there will be an interruption of benefits."
This story has been updated to include a statement from
the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare.
