April 4, 2011

The Defense Department will begin the second phase of its plan to reduce its reliance on Social Security numbers this summer, removing the printed numbers from servicemembers' military identity cards.

Starting June 1, DoD will begin to print Common Access Cards (CACs) with a new, unique identification number instead of the cardholder's Social Security Number, a Pentagon spokeswoman said. The military also will issue a second, 11-digit benefits number to cardholders who are entitled to military benefits such as commissaries and healthcare services.

CACs are DoD's implementation of Homeland Security Presidential Directive (HSPD)-12 identification cards, and are held by uniformed servicemembers, civilians and some military contractors.

The move is part of a broader DoD SSN reduction plan. In an earlier phase, the department began removing the numbers from dependents' ID cards. A final phase, slated to begin later this year, also will remove the numbers from machine-readable barcodes printed on the cards.

DoD is responding to a 2008 mandate from the Office of Management and Budget that agencies eliminate all non-essential uses of Social Security numbers in order to prevent identity theft.

http://federalnewsradio.com/?sid=2332008&nid=35

Another completed circle... We originally used "Serial Numbers". Can you old timers remember your's? I know mine but wont put it here - someone might steal my identity - "who" the heck would want to be me. Ha-Ha!!!

From the first three numbers one could tell what state and what part of the state you came from. Then they made us go to SSN's. Like "the latest style", wait long enough and it will come back to what we "had".

Seriously, I do know the importance of not showing the SSN.. Ed Smock

772 34 47,I still have my boot camp issued Pcoat almost 48 yrs later with the white stenciling to prove it.
Geeezzz that was a lifetime ago.

B164722...and NEVER to be spken as B sixteen, forty seven, Twenty two!!! (Thanks for helping me remember that BM1 Close!)

901-73-41 Boston area. I still remember it after 57yrs (I also have my old dogtags as a key chain)

B648554 - Dodge City, Kansas 1969. Just passing through when General Hershey let me know my friends and neighbors had selected me for service to my nation.

Some things you never forget! I must have repeated that service number more than a thousand times in the year or so that it was used..... Perhaps the only thing that came out of my mouth more than that was "SIR".

Jerry

B392861, July 1969, Jackson, MS

Russ

B628755 - Kansas City 1967 and yes I feel like an "oldtimer"

470 78 27 Laurel, Ms. Dec 1955.
This was at the Naval Reserve Center at Laurel and in my Senior year in high school. About 10 of us went down and signed up. Myself, Oyd Davis and Bobby Freeman had consecutive serial numbers.
Marshall

B661419 Des Moines Iowa MEPS May 1970

Ed....try as I may I can't think of a single soul! (;

Never forgot it..........B12 39 33, only a few years ago......September 1966

ALL,
I thought you could tell where in the country folks were from by the sequence of the numbers, mine B10-05-33 was assigned in December, 1965, enlisted in Albany, N.Y. Not sure that is/was true?? Who knows what they did during the draft years. My draft notice arrived while I was at my first duty station in Argentia in the fall of 1966.
Chuck

Mine 6968163 I got drafted at Adak in 66. 3 yrs after I was in. I think Eds was number 2 Noah was 1

They asked me if I knew mine when I applied for social security B725535 enlisted in San Antonio Texas 9/67. does anyone still have their draft card who joined in south texas? I bet it was Signed by Annie Hartmangruber. I went through Boot camp with her son. Met up with him again on a trip to Keflavik while working for E-Systems.

773 55 28, NAS Los Alamitos Feb. 8, 1964. Enlisted in the reserves at the age of 17. Went Active duty Jun. 28, 1966 at NAS Alameda. Was drafted twice while there.

B453XXX Cleveland, OH 1968
It's amazing that I still remember that number instantly after 40 years. I think it is a smart move not to use SSNs on ID cards. With identity theft as prevalent as it is, why did it take so long


Bill Turner
former OT2
KEF 69-70
COSL 70-72