Protecting Social Security Employees?

Social Security has published a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) that would allow the agency to refuse to release information about an employee's duty station or telephone number. The stated reason is to protect Social Security employees from the risk of domestic violence. However, the NPRM seems to fit into Social Security's longstanding aversion to releasing routine information such as agency telephone directories. For many years, Social Security stationery has been remarkable for not listing office addresses or telephone numbers, apart from Social Security's 800 number. It is a little hard to figure out why Social Security employees would need to fear domestic violence when they are at work. It is so difficult to get through to any individual Social Security employee on the telephone that it would be almost impossible to make harrassing telephone calls to any SSA employee. Almost all SSA offices now have security guards to protect employees on the job. If this rule becomes final, it would be impossible to obtain a list of Social Security ALJs with their duty station listed or a list of Module Managers at the Office of Central Operations. Is that really necessary to protect employees from attack?