PAULDING COUNTY, Ga. — A Paulding County woman says she received a stranger's social security number and other personal information in the mail by mistake. The mailing came from the Social Security Administration's Marietta field office.
"Somebody at the Social Security Administration office goofed," said mail recipient Theri Blackmon.
"If I wanted to do ID theft, I have everything at my fingertips right here."
Stuffed in along with documents pertaining to her son's benefits was a hand-written sheet about a man named Rudy Daniel. We are withholding his last name. The paper included his SSN and information on his ex-wife too.
"How did this get sent to us?" wondered Blackmon.
Consumer investigator Jim Strickland discovered Rudy was from Illinois and recently deceased.
"The social security number and other personal information of your son Rudy has been mistakenly mailed to one of my viewers," said Strickland to the man's mother while leaving a voicemail.
A few hours later, she called back and was less than pleased with the Social Security Administration.
"I'm faithful to my government and what they expect from me, and so it's disheartening to find out they don't have the same respect for me or my family," said the woman.
Strickland discovered a report from the Office of Inspector General detailing that during visits to 38 SSA offices across the country; sensitive information was at risk in 34% of them.
"It tells me that the Social Security Administration has a cavalier attitude," said Blackmon.
The report states inspectors visited two Atlanta field offices, but does not say whether Marietta had any violations. A spokesman says the Marietta employee responsible will be retrained and that SSA takes personal information security seriously. They offered apologies to Blackmon. The dead man's mother offered gratitude.
"I'm very thankful that this person went the extra mile," she said.