Originally, your Social Security number SSN was a way for the government to track your earnings and pay you retirement benefits. But over the years, it has become much more than that. It is the key to a lot of your personal information. With your name and SSN, an identity thief could open new credit and bank accounts, rent an apartment, or even get a job. You don't need to have your Social Security card with you at all times. Keep it at home in a safe place.
Check for other cards that may have your SSN on them. There is no law that prevents businesses from asking for your SSN. And you may be denied service if you don't give the number. If giving your SSN to a business doesn't seem reasonable to you, ask if you can show another form of identification. Or ask if the business can use another number as your customer number.
Remember that some government agencies can require your SSN. Area numbers - The first three numbers originally represented the state in which a person first applied for a Social Security card. Numbers started in the northeast and moved westward.
This meant that people on the east coast had the lowest numbers and those on the west coast had the highest. Since , the SSA has assigned numbers and issued cards based on the ZIP code in the mailing address provided on the original application form.
Since the applicant's mailing address doesn't have to be the same as his residence, his area number doesn't necessarily represent the state in which he resides. For many of us who received our SSNs as infants, the area number indicates the state we were born in. You can find out which area numbers go with each state at SSA. Group numbers - These two middle digits, which range from 01 through 99, are simply used to break all the SSNs with the same area number into smaller blocks, which makes administration easier.
They use a background check. Employers wishing to follow safe and prudent hiring practices are more and more often choosing to run pre-employment background screenings on potential new hires. These background screenings perform two essential functions for employers:. Social Security numbers are an invaluable tool for screeners to use when performing background checks.
Your Social Security number will not tell your full life story, but it does provide a critical framework that screeners and employers can use to ask deeper questions. First and foremost, your social security number is used to verify your identity. Your social security number is attached to one name and one birthday. Second, since social security numbers are used to track many types of personal transactions, a background check searches a variety of sources mailing houses, public records, credit bureaus to pull up information on an individual.
SSN searches will also reveal your work history and credit information such as foreclosures and bankruptcies. Most significantly, and perhaps surprisingly, criminal records are not tied to SSNs. Employers primarily run background checks as a baseline for establishing trust with a new employee. While a social security number does not tell the whole story, it provides a crucial foundation for verifying identity and building critical trust, without which any background report is essentially unreliable.
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