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lite.cnn.com - on gopher - inofficial
ARTICLE VIEW:
DOGE put Americans’ Social Security records at risk, whistleblower
says
By Tami Luhby, CNN
Updated:
5:32 PM EDT, Tue August 26, 2025
Source: CNN
Department of Government Efficiency employees at the Social Security
Administration put the records of more than 300 million Americans at
risk by creating a copy of the data in a vulnerable cloud computing
server, the agency’s chief data officer said in a whistleblower
complaint filed Tuesday.
The copy of the agency’s database – which contains people’s
names, Social Security numbers, dates of birth, addresses, citizenship
status, parents’ names and other personal information –
“apparently lacks any security oversight from SSA or tracking to
determine who is accessing or has accessed the copy of this data,”
according to Charles Borges, whose was submitted by the Government
Accountability Project to the Office of Special Counsel and
congressional committees.
“Should bad actors gain access to this cloud environment, Americans
may be susceptible to widespread identity theft, may lose vital
healthcare and food benefits, and the government may be responsible for
re-issuing every American a new Social Security Number at great
cost,” according to the complaint, which was first by the New York
Times.
Borges reported his concerns – “a disturbing pattern of
questionable and risky security access and administrative misconduct”
– to the office of the agency’s chief information officer but is
not aware of any remedial action being taken, the complaint said. He
has served as Social Security’s chief data officer since January 27.
Maintaining the privacy and security of people’s personal information
has been a major concern since the Trump administration allowed Elon
Musk’s DOGE team to embed in multiple federal agencies, including
Social Security. Former officials have raised red flags about DOGE’s
need to access and handling of the records.
A coalition of labor and advocacy groups sued to stop DOGE from gaining
access to people’s Social Security records, but the in June allowed
DOGE to review the data in its stated effort to root out fraud and
modernize the agency’s technology. Musk had repeatedly raised the
within the agency, noting that it had impossibly old people in its
files, for instance.
The Social Security Administration said Tuesday it takes all
whistleblower complaints seriously and noted that it stores all
personal data in secure environments with robust safeguards.
“The data referenced in the complaint is stored in a long-standing
environment used by SSA and walled off from the internet,” Nick
Perrine, an agency spokesperson, said in a statement. “High-level
career SSA officials have administrative access to this system with
oversight by SSA’s Information Security team. We are not aware of any
compromise to this environment and remain dedicated to protecting
sensitive personal data.”
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