A whistleblower warns a mishandled cloud copy of Social Security data could put millions at lifelong risk and force SSNs to change.

According to a protected disclosure filed with the Office of Special Counsel, Borges told the Government Accountability Project that DOGE officials working at Social Security created a “live copy” of the country’s Social Security records in a separate cloud environment that sidestepped usual security checks.

The group says those lapses put the Social Security information of more than 300 million Americans at risk.

  • gian @lemmy.grys.itEnglish
    1·
    1 day ago

    I agree with you in principal, verifying your identity before voting is important because elections are important. We should be having a conversation about creating a system that is both comprehensive and also doesn’t impose a burden on people without means. For example, a lot of people don’t have an ID to satisfy the proposed requirements and would have a difficult time getting these credentials before election day.

    That is your problem number 2…

    In addition, in order to get these documents a person would have to jump through a lot of bureaucratic loopholes and pay fees. Many of these people are poorer and are more affected by the dire economic situation. The systems are complicated and despite being involved in this sphere for a few years I couldn’t tell you the steps and fees required to get all of the documents. This isn’t a simple system where a person can just walk into a government office and walk out with a working ID.

    and that is you problem number 1.
    It is inconceivable to me that a situation like this could even exist in the US.
    I get that many US people would start crying about “freedom” and everything else but the basic line is that a ID should be mandated by law for everyone. And it should be easy to obtain, I mean how difficult could be to do it ? Seriously.

    It seems to me that these are not real problem, other countries solved them dozens of years ago, it is just that you people (assuming you are from US) don’t want to solve them.

    If we’re going to have a system requiring Secure IDs (I’m not sure the EU analog, but you guys have a similar secure identity scheme being pushed) then we need to make getting Secure IDs dead simple because the average citizen needs to be able to vote and also shouldn’t be subjected to heavy administrative burden in order to participate in the democratic system.

    A card with a chip and all the information in that chip, to read it you need just a reader.
    Or a qrcode with all the information encoded ?
    Even the old Italian ID (made of paper) was secure, it does not seems to be a problem without solutions, just copy from someone who already did it.

    As for the problem with electronic black box voting stations, yes, they are a problem per se irregardless of who propose or built them. They would be a problem for the exact same reasons if they were proposed by Biden. But I still belive that a selection of who can vote done as you suggest is impraticable, you have no way of knowing who vote what before. A massive refusal to allow a certain population to vote would be noted in the end.

    • FauxLiving@lemmy.worldEnglish
      1·
      23 hours ago

      It seems to me that these are not real problem, other countries solved them dozens of years ago, it is just that you people (assuming you are from US) don’t want to solve them.

      I’m aware of the problems and I donate a large portion of my time towards working to fix these issues which were put into place long before I was born. These systems exist as they do for a lot of reasons, many of which are bad. Fixing them will take time and political willpower which, prior to ID being weaponized as a means of cutting off voters, did not exist in the US.

      It isn’t as simple as printing out a QR code or loading personal documents onto an ISO 14443-compliant smartcard. It will require infrastructure, staffing and public education. This isn’t something that can be done by election day (in November '26).

      They would be a problem for the exact same reasons if they were proposed by Biden. But I still belive that a selection of who can vote done as you suggest is impraticable, you have no way of knowing who vote what before. A massive refusal to allow a certain population to vote would be noted in the end.

      It’s bad idea no matter who is in charge. All of our voting systems are open to observers and there are multiple observers at all critical points of voting.

      Circumventing all of those checks by having a single system who can simply deny a person the ability to vote with no recourse is a bad idea, it would have been a bad idea under Biden and it is a bad idea now.

      A massive refusal to allow a certain population to vote would be noted in the end.

      It doesn’t need to be massive to affect outcomes. A few thousand votes can swing close elections.

      Even if someone notices something strange. Do you imagine that Donald Trump would allow for the Department of Homeland Security to investigate the Department of Homeland Security’s handling of claimed election interference? Would the newly elected Republican Congress vote to impeach him if he didn’t?

      If someone notices vote interference, should they call Donald Trump’s FBI, Donald Trump’s DHS or Donald Trump’s CIA? How do you imagine that conversation would go once it made it to the attention of Pattel, Noem or Gabbard?