Social Security’s Office of Inspector General (OIG) has issued a report on data exchange agreements affecting its Numident system. It reveals that the agency already has more than 3,400 data exchange agreements and expects to increase that number by 10% a year despite the fact that the agency already has a backlog of 1.3 billion data exchanges that haven’t been processed. OIG “recommended SSA establish processes for components to collaborate on matching criteria and enhance criteria to increase verified matches where appropriate. SSA agreed to implement our recommendations.”
Others with more knowledge of Numident can correct me but I think Numident isn’t even all that important. It’s not used for benefit payment purposes. It’s highly unlikely that any significant numbers of ineligible benefits recipients will be discovered no matter how many data matches you process. This sounds like a report designed to appeal to President Trump’s obsession with undocumented aliens. I wonder how many of the data exchanges already underway are cost effective. The number of data exchanges already underway troubles me. There’s too many opportunities for errors that will cause unnecessary problems for people who have done nothing wrong. These databases, like Social Security’s and everyone else’s, contain errors but how important are they if the data isn’t being used for benefit payment purposes?
Obviously, many people misunderstand the purpose of the Social Security Number (SSN) and the information contained on this SSN (numident) record. Please give these current government officials a history lesson on how we have evolved to this point in the role of the SSN. By the way, explain the role that our society wants its federal government to play.
ReplyDeleteI think you’re misunderstanding the report. It’s saying that SSA has a ton of data exchanges, many of which *do affect benefit payments,* and that those exchanges often check against the Numident to confirm that the external data source data can be accurately matched to a person. “John Doe SSN 000000000 is now in prison.” If SSA has SSN 000000000 as *Jon* Doe, it’s not a perfect match. SSA can’t automatically “accept” the information.
ReplyDeleteOIG is recommending that SSA employ “fuzzy” matching logic. With fuzzy matching, “John Doe SSN 000000000 is now in prison” could be matched with Jon Doe SSN 000000000, so SSA could automatically suspend benefits.
Basically, the Numident match is the first step to “accepting” the information provided by many data exchanges.
SSA said they have no plans to improve their matching logic. OIG is recommending that SSA brainstorm on it, and SSA agreed.