Pretty strong words in the dissent here:

> JUSTICE JACKSON, with whom JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR joins, dissenting from the grant of application for stay. Today the Court grants “emergency” relief that allows the Social Security Administration (SSA) to hand DOGE staff- ers the highly sensitive data of millions of Americans. The Government wants to give DOGE unfettered access to this personal, non-anonymized information right now—before the courts have time to assess whether DOGE’s access is lawful. So it asks this Court to stay a lower court’s decision to place temporary and qualified limits on DOGE’s data ac- cess while litigation challenging DOGE’s authority to ac- cess the data is pending. But the Government fails to sub- stantiate its stay request by showing that it or the public will suffer irreparable harm absent this Court’s interven- tion. In essence, the “urgency” underlying the Govern- ment’s stay application is the mere fact that it cannot be bothered to wait for the litigation process to play out before proceeding as it wishes. That sentiment has traditionally been insufficient to jus- tify the kind of extraordinary intervention the Government seeks. But, once again, this Court dons its emergency-re- sponder gear, rushes to the scene, and uses its equitable power to fan the flames rather than extinguish them. See, e.g., Noem v. Doe, 605 U. S. ___, ___ (2025) (JACKSON, J., dissenting from grant of application for stay) (slip op., at 5) (explaining that, by granting a stay, the Court was allowing the Government to terminate the lawful parole status of half a million noncitizens before the courts could determine whether such agency action was lawful). Once again, re- spectfully, I dissent.

"sensitive Social Security information"

We really need to do something about social security numbers. They've all been leaked and there's no way to put the cat back in the bag.

And when people use them fraudulent the bank can somehow hold YOU responsible? Total insanity.

The replacement driver's license of a colleague of mine was stolen from his mail, and since then his financial life has been ruined.

Cars were rented in his name across multiple states and never returned, At&T charged dozen of apple products in his account, SoFi approved and disbursed loan in his name, credit cards were opened, credit score completely ruined. Some of them happened even after he froze his SSN.

And the answer he gets is "Too bad, there is nothing we can do". He is now fighting multiple legal cases against him.

Every time I think about it my blood boils.

> froze his SSN

What does it mean to freeze an SSN, and how does one go about it? I'm familiar with freezing credit (through the big 3 credit score companies), but that doesn't sound sufficient to protect against a lot of what you're describing.

I think he started with online available info (I believe Reddit has a good identity theft community), but the thing is that notices keep coming long after fraud has been committed. So every week he would find out there are more things he was on the hook for.

Eventually he hired a lawyer to help him out, there are so many reporting agencies (for subprime loans etc) that you need to reach out to.

Long term a new SSN will be issued for him, but there is a lot of cleanup before that.

Can I ask why in the USA can a malicious individual with a random person’s SSN number and name allow them to wreak havoc?

In my country we just have a name but you need an ID document to get anything done.

Do banks etc. consider an SSN number to be a password?

There is no way to freeze an SSN. As you pointed out, all you can really freeze are credit files. In some circumstances, victims of identity theft can obtain a new SSN.

https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/credit-scor...

Thing I never got about ID thieves pulling all this off with stolen basic credentials is just how they get approved so widely.

I mean, imagine, often, when you're the ACTUAL holder of an identity, trying to legitimately obtain credit, buy products and so forth, you get all sorts of absurd algorithmic or anti-fraud roadblocks that can make it tricky or fully block you, but then some dude with only part of your ID paperwork in his hands can just go ahead and take out loans, get credit, use your name for X or Y official thing just like that? Then also, them getting the mailing addresses they need for all these scams to work. How do they pull that off too?

I'm really puzzled by how these contradictions work?

I think this is one of those cases where the actual holder of the identity sees the process as an annoyance, and the ID thief sees it as a job. If you repeat the same procedure a hundred times you get really good at doing it efficiently.

That's a good point, and makes sense. Also, they can afford to be blithely reckless about all those attempts, more than someone stressing about rejections with their own, one true ID.

As a European I'm dumbfounded how this issue alone isn't deciding elections in the US. Somehow everyone just accepted having their identity stolen every once in a while.

I'm in my 40s, and I don't know anyone personally who's dealt with any kind of significant issue due to identity theft or fraud.

Like, occasionally my credit card company will call me up about some fraudulent transactions and then they'll mail me a new card and take the fraud off my bill.

A problem can be simultaneously incredibly acute for an unlucky subset, structurally really problematic, and also on average have very low impact. Those problems generally don't decide elections.

I periodically receive OTPs I didn't request, because malicious actors are trying password stuffing with really old credentials of mine from data breaches. It's relatively frequent.

Yeah, but the consequences of things like that, if they succeed, are rarely anywhere near the level Nord VPN and Life Lock would have us believe.

Identity handed to Musk's businesses, along with all of the personal history there, is mind-boggling. But MAGA doesn't care, and all the enabling congresspeople will just say "omg, we didn't know that we should care".

I suppose it's not as bad as believing/promoting the lies that got the US into two wars in Iraq, but it's still bad and sort of feels like it goes into the same bucket.

You would be shocked how Blase people are about it.

The credit card companies block a transaction and issue a card replacement and everyone feels OK again.

I have had a couple of PayPal alternatives accounts opened using my email address. Still feel on edge about it. Holy shit. The only thing which gives me a modicum of peace is I get free credit monitoring from the Equifax boondoggle.

"As a European..."

https://qbix.com/blog/2023/06/12/no-way-to-prevent-this-says...

https://qbix.com/blog/2021/01/25/no-way-to-prevent-this-says...

So it happens everywhere

I'm not necessarily disagreeing with you, but non of your links refer identity theft in Europe (Turkey might be considered Europe in some geographic definition, but when people talk politics/law they typically mean the EU).

That silly little phrase gets smugly mentioned on this site so often that it should be labeled a parody of itself. As a European myself, I can't generalize shit about people from my enormous multi-ethnic continent of several hundred million inhabitants and dozens of states, mini states and assorted autonomous regions. It's full of contradictions, problems, social disasters, bureaucratic fuckeries, authoritarian nonsense, simmering brands of racism/xenophobia and other assorted crap that varies widely from one little part of its landscape to another, sometimes drastically.

Many other Europeans on this site should consider climbing down from their imaginary pedestals of moral superiority. Very little about either past or present day Europe (insofar as you can generalize about it at all) merits such a sense of superiority, at all. It all comes with trade-offs.

Reading some HN comments from "As a European" types, you'd think they were already living in a wonderfully socialist version of the singularity, and it got built right next to the Pearly Gates, where it daily receives the airy blessings of winged angels.

> Reading some HN comments from "As a European" types, you'd think they were already living in a wonderfully socialist version of the singularity, and it got built right next to the Pearly Gates, where it daily receives the airy blessings of winged angels.

Hearing stories about the US, that is indeed how it feels. I pretty regularly read unironic stories of people that literally lived on the street because of some random misfortune. I just can’t imagine that happening in my home country (e.g. socialist paradise), and I’m inclined to believe much of western Europe is the same.

The claimaints’ concern is more around “family court and children’s school records and medical and mental health information” [1] than SSNs.

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/06/us/politics/supreme-court...

> We really need to do something about social security numbers.

Get everybody to realize that identifiers and credentials are pretty much polar opposites in design space? Sounds like one of the many impossible infosec literacy crusades, unfortunately.

Meanwhile Switzerland is implementing e-ID which gives citizens private and public keys so they can sign and prove things without leaking their whole identity.

The USPS, with their existing delivery infrastructure and massive presence, would be a great fit for doing this in the US. Think like DoD CAC cards, but for ordinary citizens.

It'll never happen, though.

You don't think the USPS is on the chopping block?? The new Postmaster General is from the FedEx BOD. https://www.commondreams.org/news/david-steiner-postal-servi...

SSNs were never designed to be private information. There should be no expectation that they are.

They weren't designed to be used as general-purpose identifiers by non-government entities, either, but here we are.

My college classes used to post grades, on paper, taped to the wall, listed by SSN.

Which, assuming it was in the last 50 years or so (assuming it didn't have individual non-compulsory signed and dated written consent of every individual whose grades were so posted) a violation of federal law (specifically, the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act of 1974.)

This is enough to make me put all of my assets in a trust.

We don’t need to do anything about SSNs, we just need to not bother borrowers with pricing they are innocent, and rather require lenders to prove the person they are claiming they did business with is the the person who agreed to borrow the money.

The whole thing is a giant corporate subsidiary to lenders.

  The decision lets DOGE have full access to personally identifiable information in the Social Security Administration database while the case proceeds on appeal.

Is that common? If the legal decision is still not fully answered, I world expect the correct answer is to minimize potential harm, and keep the data locked up by default.

Yes, this feels pretty bad. If the court later finds that it's not appropriate for DOGE to have this information (and such a ruling survives appeal), it will be too late, and the damage will have been done.

working as intended! once the cat is out of the bag - just say oopsie and go home.

I think this ruling is terrible and dissent is very well justified exactly for the reasons you put here. It’s sad we got such a terrible Supreme Court which is seemingly exist to only keep giving (republican) executive whatever they want.

It depends on the area of law but there's generally a balancing test as to whether or not a court should issue an injunction. There are a number of factors such as the likelihood that the plaintiff will succeed but also if the injunction (or lack thereof) causes permanent harm or can be reversed.

Imagine a court was considering the issue from years ago when Australian authorities were deciding to release the cane toad to kill sugar cane pests. That's not a decision taht you can take back. Once they're released, there's really no rolling that back. So a court would generally side on issuing an injunction pending an appeal for that very reason.

As a historical side note, the cane toad was released and it's been an ecological disaster ever since.

Now imagine another case where a government agency is requiring all fishing boats to install transponders and they're relatively cheap. There's reallly no irreversible harm either way so a court will tend to look instead at the likelihood of the plaintiff prevailing instead.

At least that's how it should work.

In practice, particularly with the Supreme Court through its entire history, there's a fairly accurate way of predicting how they'll rule: pick the side that favors the wealthy and powerful and that's how they'll rule way more often than not.

There are exceptions to this and it's not universal (eg decisions rolling back segregation) but it is (IMHO) arguably the best predictor.

"When considering whether to grant a stay, this Court looks to four factors: “(1) whether the stay applicant has made a strong showing that he is likely to succeed on the merits; (2) whether the applicant will be irreparably injured absent a stay; (3) whether issuance of the stay will substantially injure the other parties interested in the proceeding; and (4) where the public interest lies.”"

-- https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/24pdf/24a1063_6j37.pdf

"harm" is kind of the key word here - an executive agency (USDS) is trying to access other executive agency data perform work the executive branch has prioritized. Take the personalities out of the question for a minute.

Gov says that enjoining them from accessing the data is doing harm by preventing the work.

In opposition, the plaintiffs say that if USDS has access to the data, it will sell it or abscond it, or something. That's a claim of potential harm.

First, is the plaintiff likely to succeed on the merits? Probably unlikely that plaintiffs will ultimately succeed in preventing data access within the executive branch. The harm is theoretical, in the future, and not very well articulated. Nothing about USDS access to the data is structurally enabling the selling or distribution of data.

Second, where is the most harm at present? Real harm on one hand, potential harm on the other. So likelihood of the harm in the future needs to be really imminent, real, highly likely to outweigh actual harm in a work stoppage.

That's basically the formula.

The access of private data between different agencies (or whatever) across executive can be (and probably) illegal. And if this access will be considered such it would be impossible to revert.

On other hand we have government trying to do something, and their potential harm is delay their plans until courts will consider the case.

You need to compare not only immediate harms, but more importantly potential harms of the emergency order in case if final decision differs from (assumed) emergency one. You also make merits question to be very straightforward but it’s not – other courts ruled plaintiffs have good chances to succeed on merits.

I think the balancing act here is clear.

> an executive agency (USDS)

The Trump Administration has repeatedly said DOGE is not a federal agency (mostly so they can say they're exempt from FOIA).

Somewhat related: with Elon and DJT feuding, how does that work with DOGE? My understanding is that Elon hired the DOGE people, so does he still have a backdoor into DOGE, for purposes of getting data and manipulating outcomes?

What's he going to do with SSN data in this hypothetical where he is outside the government ? This data is not terribly difficult to get in any case. There have been countless SSN leaks and dumps. It's only useful as a political and administrative tool while you are in the government where you make up some numbers and show savings.

It's all theatre man.

Like the other poster said, it's all an act. Tesla sales are way down and Elon's entire fortune is tied to Tesla stock. They are trying to get some gullible people to buy Tesla's and the press is running with it like it's a real feud.

Ah the 4D chess move of “Call me a pedophile and say I should be impeached, that’ll help your stock AND my ratings!”

All of the razors still apply and I’m confused why we’re so reticent to accept that.

Trump is immune to these types of attacks. His supporters don't operate on the same value system. He has been linked with Epstein for years. He has been impeached twice. None of that matters to his supporters and saying Elon saying it can only gain him favor with liberals.

> They are trying to get some gullible people to buy Tesla's and the press is running with it like it's a real feud.

I don't understand the theory here. Who exactly would be buying Teslas as a result of the feud?

The order: https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/24pdf/24a1063_6j37.pdf

I'm convinced all these datasets they are getting access to is going into a vector DB.

Trump family data is in here. Doge also has the IRS data. Maybe Musk will have have more goods on Trump in their future negotiations.

Anyone with access know what the ruling was justice wise?

the three libs objected to granting the application, with Jackson filing a dissent saying the court should wait for the appeals process to organically run its course rather than grant an emergency application for relief. I'm not sure that any opinion was expressed regarding likelihood of success of either party, just that they favored letting it percolate.