I didn’t know the particular piece of information you are about to read until I read an article in which the writer’s social security number was compromised by none other than the Social Security Administration. It all happened because U.S. Territories issue their own social security numbers and a U. S. agency had made a loan.
In fact, the Federated States of Micronesia, the Republic of the Marshall Islands and the Republic of Palau all have their own Social Security Administrations. The only difference between the numbers is the mainland issues 9 digit numbers and the Territories issue 8 or 7 (Palau) digit numbers.
The fun starts when one of these numbers is entered into a computer. It appears mainland computers are trained – programmed – to add a zero or two zeroes to fill in the eighth and ninth spot. But it doesn’t put the zero(s) at the end or what we would call the ninth number. It puts it/them first.

Joshua Dorkin

Recent Important Snippets You May Not Have Seen
by Tom Koziol | February 5, 2010After reading a story titled, “Local homeowners get the runaround on loan modifications” in my local paper this week, I decided to do a bit of snooping about the HAMP program. Fortunately the title company I use for my real estate deals has a very proactive website. It not only gives me the latest NOD [...]