Whistleblower: DOGE Put Millions of Americans’ Data at Risk

The personal information of hundreds of millions of Americans is at risk after the Department of Government Effectiveness uploaded a copy of Social Security's vast database to a cloud server in June, according to a whistleblower complaint from the Social Security Administration's chief data officer.

The vulnerable DOGE server contains information about every American who applies for a Social Security card, including applicants' names, dates of birth, citizenship, ethnicity, phone numbers, addresses and other personal information, potentially putting the security of more than 300 million Americans at risk, according to complaintfiled by Charles Borges with the Office of Special Counsel and Members of Congress.

“If attackers gain access to this cloud environment, Americans could be subject to widespread identity theft, could lose vital health and nutrition benefits, and the government could be responsible for re-issuing each new Social Security number to Americans at great cost,” the complaint states.

Which database did DOGE allegedly copy?

According to the complaint, DOGE transferred Social Security information from the Numerical Identification System database (NUMIDENT) to an internal server that only DOGE had access to.

NUIDENT contains all the information you need to apply for a US Social Security card. Near 550 million Social Security numbers were issued earlier this month.

What potential risks do Americans face?

When asked about Borges' report that DOGE copied confidential NUMIDENT data onto an insecure server, the Social Security Administration told TIME in a statement that “Commissioner Bisignano and the Social Security Administration take all whistleblower complaints seriously.”

It goes on to say that “SSA maintains all personal information in secure environments that have strong security measures in place to protect vital information. The data referenced in the complaint is stored in a long-standing environment used by SSA and is isolated from the Internet. Senior SSA officials have administrative access to this system under the supervision of SSA's information security team. We are not aware of any breaches of this environment and remain committed to protecting sensitive personal information.”

But a whistleblower report filed by lawyers for the Government Accountability Project, a whistleblower advocacy group, highlights concerns about the lack of “independent security controls” for the server, “including independent tracking of who has access to the data and how they use it.”

Borges' statement also said there were “no proven auditing or oversight mechanisms in place for the DOGE server.”

“This kind of abuse is something I have not seen from the federal government,” said Susan Landau, a professor of cybersecurity and policy at Tufts University, calling the alleged move to put such sensitive information at risk a “cowboy move.”

Landau said if this information were available, scammers could be more convincing in extorting or deceiving people.

She explained that if attackers gain access to a person's NUMIDENT information, they can easily find additional sources of personal information and create a holistic profile of the person that can be used to impersonate official organizations such as banks or lure people into pyramid schemes.

Landau also warned of potential harm if countries such as China or Russia were able to access DOGE's social security cloud.

“I’m shocked,” Landau added. “The federal government has worked really hard over the last 20 years to protect this data. Now… it seems like there's more and more data being created and available in one place. And that's not a good security practice. And putting it on an unsecured server is just crazy.”

Herbert Lin, a cyber policy and security fellow at Stanford University, expressed concern about the fact that access to Social Security data has been expanded to DOGE employees beyond federal channels.

“The situation is worse now because more people have potential access to it,” Lin said. “I don't know who they hire, and if anyone knows, let me know. But that's the problem.”

Lin also sees the legality of DOGE's ability to interfere with federal agencies as a key issue in moving data that was once protected solely by the Social Security Administration.

“I mean, what's important to me is the fact that his authority is not based on an act of Congress,” Lin said. “I think it should matter to everyone.”

How is the government reacting?

Borges' complaint describes his internal outreach efforts, saying he told his superiors that reissuing Social Security numbers to Americans whose information had been compromised was the “worst-case outcome.” According to the report, after various internal complaints, Borges received no information “indicating that the cloud environment hosting NUMIDENT data of the American public is protected by best practices and independent security controls in accordance with industry standards.”

The complaint alleges that the Office of the General Counsel further advised employees not to respond to numerous requests from Borges about the security and risks of the DOGE Social Security server.

Borges is expected to meet with the oversight committee and members of Congress to discuss his findings.