Here's The Social Security Fraud -- 36,000 Instances!

     From a recent audit report by Social Security's Office of Inspector General (OIG):

In October 2011, we began tracking allegations that indicated individuals other than the beneficiaries or their representatives had fraudulently redirected benefit payments away from the beneficiaries’ bank accounts to accounts the individuals controlled. As of May 20, 2013, we had received over 36,000 reports concerning an unauthorized change or a suspected attempt to make an unauthorized change to an SSA beneficiary’s record. ...

We [at OIG] are committed to investigating allegations of direct deposit fraud. Unfortunately, because of the nature and methods criminals employ to perpetrate this type of fraud, the overwhelming majority of these type of allegations provided little information that lead to identifying a possible subject .

     Certainly, credible cases of fraud in the Social Security disability programs must be investigated but the big time Social Security fraud is in the redirection of benefit payments. Usually organized crime is involved and much of the crime is based overseas. So why doesn't this type of fraud get more attention from the House Social Security Subcommittee? It doesn't fit their narrative. In fact, it goes against their narrative since the vulnerability to this type of fraud was created when the federal government wanted to stop spending money cutting checks to Social Security beneficiaries. Everyone is against waste. It's just that it was usually easy to trace where the money went when a federal check was intercepted and an endorsement forged. It's not so easy when a direct deposit is siphoned into a phony bank account account and then rapidly transferred several times between accounts in places like Anjouan, Belize, Estonia, Gibraltar, the Isle of Man, Nevis and Vanuatu.