Plan for Reducing Unnecessary use of Social Security Numbers

FY-16 Implementation Plan to Reduce or Eliminate Unnecessary Use of Social Security Numbers

In accordance with OMB Memorandum M-07-16, EPA is reviewing its findings to identify instances in which the collection or use of the SSN is superfluous.

• US Government Accountability Office (GAO) conducted a government survey on the reduction of SSNs in August of 2016. At that time, EPA reported 16 federal information systems collected a total of 1,516,450 records. EPA is using these numbers as the established baseline of PII collections. From this baseline, superfluous uses will be identified.
  • If superfluous use is identified, a system-appropriate plan will be developed to remove or supplement the SSN with another identifier and/or prevent the SSN from being displayed or printed.
• EP!’s National Privacy Program is implementing the plan for reducing SSNs by issuing a data call to identify the collection and uses in systems, programs, Websites and on forms. In addition, in FY 2017 forms (paper/electronic) that collect SSN will be reviewed to determine if the collection is unnecessary and can be replaced with another identifier or removed.
  • Review of Privacy Act Statement or Privacy Notice (PN)
  • Ensure PAS/PN is present, adequate, and include the appropriate provisions at the point of collection.
• EPA has already begun to reduce the use of SSNs in systems, Websites and forms through truncating, not displaying and using alternative identifiers.
  • Any reduction of SSN uses are reviewed twice a year and reported annually.
  • This SSN reduction plan is an ongoing process. 

Determine the number of SSNs reduced or eliminated: 1 truncated, 1 no longer displayed, 1 alternative number