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Owning your own data sounds good. Unfortunately, once you share a piece of data, it's out there forever. What we all need is to have our own personal servers t
by hyperliner 12y ago
Owning your own data sounds good. Unfortunately, once you share a piece of data, it's out there forever.
What we all need is to have our own personal servers that validate tokens. Then we would just give out these one-time use tokens to people or institutions. Does the bank need a SSN? Well, here is an auto-generated token. Bank stores that, but to validate it, it calls your personal little server, which checks for use.
Unfortunately, systems are built which require personal information. So eventually, for example, the government or a third party service to get credit reports needs your actual SSN. Then you are hosed.
Alternatively, all information could be free, but ALL systems would require your personal server for "permission to use." That of course is highly complicated.
The problem is everybody / every app thinks they need some piece of information. It bothers me when I go to a weekend clinic to take my son and they ask for an SSN. Why? I am going to pay you and walk out of here. "We need to send the report to your real pediatrician." well, just send it. It's not like they wont be able to file it.
I hope somebody smart comes up with a definitive solution, but a lot of processes, people's attitudes and systems need to be recreated from scratch.
- judk 12y agoThe more people complain and refuse to let their SSN be cusomter id, the more vendors will backoff. OTOH, there are so many "legitimate" SSN abusers that it's a lost cause.
- pjc50 12y agoThe US use of SSN seems strange to me, given that the UK equivalent ("NI", national insurance number) isn't nearly as commonly asked for. You need to give it to your employer and sometimes your bank and that's it. Healthcare has its own numbering system, but I've no idea what mine is and it's been years since I needed it for anything.