DOGE Catch-All

[DiehardHeelFan]

You’re really taking that statement to quantify the number of people with a null birthdate in SS?

 

[ColdBlueSteel]

1. Data files are never clean. It used to do database work and every single data file I ever saw had missing entries or fields. I don't know how or why, and I'm not sure anyone really does -- not in general at least. It's just the way the world is. Maybe newer systems don't have that problem, but these systems are not new.

2. Very well could be fake SSNs, but not necessarily. Could also be employer IDs that were mistakenly input into the system.

1. Why aren’t these systems new and as capable as the HR and payroll systems at my 1,500 employee company?

15 years ago American Express was calling me about a potential fraudulent transaction within a day of the charge being made.

Not like SSNs are all that important I guess

 

[wmheel1287]

1. Why aren’t these systems new and as capable as the HR and payroll systems at my 1,500 employee company?

15 years ago American Express was calling me about a potential fraudulent transaction within a day of the charge being made.

Not like SSNs are all that important I guess

Why do you continue to ask diversionary questions?

 

[DiehardHeelFan]

1. Why aren’t these systems new and as capable as the HR and payroll systems at my 1,500 employee company?

15 years ago American Express was calling me about a potential fraudulent transaction within a day of the charge being made.

Not like SSNs are all that important I guess

Why can’t rocket scientists (teenage hackers) understand coding date formats?

 

[Granville]

DOGE-affiliated employee accessed IRS system with sensitive taxpayer information

The Integrated Data Retrieval System allows IRS employees to access taxpayer information.

www.nbcnews.com

 

[ColdBlueSteel]

Why can’t rocket scientists (teenage hackers) understand coding date formats?

Probably the same reason my mechanic can’t adjust a carburetor.

 

[BlooVooDoo]

1. Why aren’t these systems new and as capable as the HR and payroll systems at my 1,500 employee company?

15 years ago American Express was calling me about a potential fraudulent transaction within a day of the charge being made.

Not like SSNs are all that important I guess

I think using your AmEx requires less identity verification than collecting Social Security.

 

[wmheel1287]

Probably the same reason my mechanic can’t adjust a carburetor.

Any mechanic can adjust a carb. If you mean the folks that work on modern cars, they are techs...most definitely not mechanics.

 

[ColdBlueSteel]

Any mechanic can adjust a carb. If you mean the folks that work on modern cars, they are techs...most definitely not mechanics.

You’re right. Allow me a mulligan?

Probably the same reason the various auto repair shops I patronize can’t adjust a carburetor.

 

[ChapelHillSooner]

Supposedly this was due to the DOB being null in the database and was interpreted as the date of Nov 7, 1858 which was the epoch for those systems.

I didn’t exactly get this right. As others pointed out in this case it was from 1875.

 

[dcphx]

I've said it elsewhere and I'll repeat it here. Like the rest of the Republican Party, he is in far too deep to turn back. You think folks like Lindsey Graham don't know exactly how bad Trump is? Once you mount that dragon, there is no going back.

Thing is, this isn't Trump, it's Musk and Thiel/Andreasen et al. Republican politicians really have not a clue how far they will go now that they have their hooks into the system.

 

[superrific]

1. Why aren’t these systems new and as capable as the HR and payroll systems at my 1,500 employee company?

15 years ago American Express was calling me about a potential fraudulent transaction within a day of the charge being made.

Not like SSNs are all that important I guess

Your 1500 person company? Are you fucking serious? That's literally 1/1000th of the federal government in head count alone. The government's data needs and systems are probably 1000x as complicated.

Banks run on legacy systems also. The reason they aren't new is that there's no need for them to be. The federal government's payment system is incredibly mission-critical to, you know, the entire world economy. You can't afford to let it go down because you're trying to put in a new system and something goes wrong.

Everything works now. You put in a new system, and maybe that system doesn't talk very well to a different legacy system. There might not be great code documentation because when these things were programmed in the 70s, documentation was much worse for a number of reasons. There might be hidden logic jammed into a subroutine somewhere.

You don't fuck around with all that unless there's a really good reason to do so. And ColdBlueSteel's preferences are not really good reasons. Missing birthdates is also very unlikely to be worth creating bugs in the payment systems.

Again, it's not just the government. Private banks, too. Big corporations.

 

[Willy]

Due to bank mergers and lack of downtime, bank systems are essentially a hodgepodge of various mainframe systems built in the 70s. There absolutely is a need to upgrade those systems, but 24/7 banking makes that very difficult to do.

 

[nycfan]

Well, is it true they found social security payments going to a 150-year-old?
Honest question, have no idea what’s fact

No it was a misunderstanding of how COBOL works — a null set (0 for lack of a date in a date field) defaults to 150 years.

 

[nycfan]

No it was a misunderstanding of how COBOL works — a null set (0 for lack of a date in a date field) defaults to 150 years.

In addition, DOGE is consistently incorrectly claiming that because the check-paying function at Treasury, which relies on the paying agency to confirm a payment is authorized and pays it without further diligence based on that authorization, doesn’t include or cross-check information on a payee, no one has it or is cross-checking it. Which is false.

 

[heelslegup]

IRS should say that if DOGE gets the files, then the IRS will publish everyone's tax returns for anyone to view. that will stop these plutocrat Madame DeFarges cold. DOGE is intended to make it to where billionaires and other high net worth individuals pay almost no taxes. I think Peter Thiel said people of genius (like himself) should not have to pay taxes.

 

[tarheelbillie]

No, it wasn’t fact. It was the fact they couldn’t understand a specific ISO coding for a date format.

Besides that, 150 year old?? You honestly think a payment was sent to a 150 year old?? Let’s say it’s a random glitch. Who cashes it? With what ID?

Yes, it is true. Plus, the old gentleman was writing checks and balancing his checkbook. All legit.

Then bitcoins for refunds....what could go wrong?

I know a young tech type who lost his entire savings dealing with that silly crap. Nearly $50,000.

 

[nycfan]

 

[MOUNTAINH33L]

I would find it difficult to resist the urge to troll these fuckers. It's probably best that I deleted my account once Musk took the mask off.

 

[nycfan]

If true, raises more questions. Why so many social security numbers without birth dates? Many different versions of COBOL? Undocumented workers with fake SSNs?

“…
on Monday morning Musk doubled down, posting a screenshot of what he claims were figures from “the Social Security database” to X, writing that “the numbers of people in each age bucket with the death field set to FALSE!”

The figures suggested that over 10 millions people aged over 120 were collecting benefits.

“Maybe Twilight is real and there are a lot of vampires collecting Social Security,” Musk wrote.

The database Musk took the screenshot from listed almost 400 million people, which is more than five times the number of people receiving benefits in 2024, according to the SSA’s own website. It’s also significantly more than the entire US population.

The fact that the Social Security system contains millions of entries from people who are dead is likely distinct from a potential COBOL-caused error, and also not news.

A report written by the SSA’s inspector general in 2023 found that 98 percent of those aged 100 or older in the Social Security databases are not in receipt of any benefits. The report added that the database would not be updated because it would cost too much money to do so.

“DOGE going into all these agencies with largely unfettered access with a wrecking ball and no understanding of the business logic and structure behind the code, database and configured business logic, related payment systems, and integrated decision trees, poses real risks to the privacy and persona-level data of millions of people across all of those records,” Thomas Drake, a former National Security Agency executive-turned-whistleblower, tells WIRED. …”

No, 150-Year-Olds Aren’t Collecting Social Security Benefits

Elon Musk claims to have found rampant fraud in the Social Security Administration. There’s a much simpler explanation.

www.wired.com