• dragonlobster@programming.dev
    37·
    5 hours ago

    It’s hard to figure out what he’s talking about , when he says the “whole social security database”. Like in which tables are they duplicated? Does it mean the entire row is duplicated or just the SSN, it might make sense to be duplicated depending on the schema. Is it an append only db, so there might be updated columns on the same ssn and you need to filter by the latest update timestamp? Who knows.

    But also, saying that there’s a “social security database” and then following that up by the govt “doesn’t use SQL” so… the db is actually just a spreadsheet? A .txt file? The SSNs are just written down in someone’s notebook? Lol

    • lightnsfw@reddthat.com
      3·
      29 minutes ago

      He looked over the shoulder of one of the script kiddies he hired and saw 2 lines with the same SSN, freaked out, remembered some database words he picked up somewhere and hopped on twitter.

    • frezik@midwest.social
      22·
      3 hours ago

      SSNs are reused. Someone dies and their number gets reassigned. The database could easily be keeping track of all previous assignments for any given SSN.

      Remember, SSNs are designed for social security and nothing else. They got picked up as a unique ID by private interests as a hack. They were never supposed to be as widespread in use as they are. The federal government using it this way is the specific, designed use case.

      • captainlezbian@lemmy.world
        5·
        3 hours ago

        Yep, and any attempt to replace them with a purpose designed government ID has gotten conspiracy nuts to shut it down