What happens with your SSN when you die? Can somebody use it?

Question

Here's an example.... If somebody dies in 1978, and in 2003 somebody gets this person's SSN (you can do it through many websites. www.net-detective.com for example...) and uses it. Let's say this person applies for credit (credit cards, etc) and gets approved..... what happens with this SSN? Does it report to the credit bureaus? Can the cc companies know this is not the real person?

Answer 1

The Social Security Administration (SSA) releases the fact of death and the individual's name, date of death and SSN to any requestor under the terms of a court settlement made in 1980 in connection with a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit brought against SSA. SSA makes the Death Master File (DMF) available through the Department of Commerce's National Technical Information Service (NTIS). NTIS sells the information to the private sector. Any private sector customer (e.g., credit card companies, financial institutions) can purchase the DMF from NTIS.

With this information available, credit card companies certainly do check to make sure that applicants for credit don't try to use the social security number of deceased person.

Answer 2

Your SSN is not the only thing that creditors use. The only way confusion could happen is if the two people have the same names, which is highly unlikely.

Answer 3

I have heard of people stealing identities that way, but I think credit card companies have access to SS numbers to people who are deceased.

Answer 4

It would be illegal and if the Social Security office finds out, they will start trying to track down the person. First with letters asking the person to call them.