[Congressional Record Volume 159, Number 103 (Thursday, July 18, 2013)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1090]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




  INTRODUCTION OF THE ``ALEXIS AGIN IDENTITY THEFT PROTECTION ACT OF 
                                 2013''

                                 ______
                                 

                          HON. XAVIER BECERRA

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                        Thursday, July 18, 2013

  Mr. BECERRA. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to join with my friend and 
colleague, Sam Johnson, to introduce this bipartisan legislation to 
protect Americans from identity theft.
  I have long been concerned about the problem of identity theft, where 
all too often the Social Security number, SSN, which is assigned to 
make sure Americans get their earned Social Security benefits, is the 
key to committing fraud. For a number of years, Chairman Johnson and I 
have worked together on a bipartisan basis with other members of our 
Social Security Subcommittee to find ways to better protect Americans 
from identity theft.
  One of the most troubling forms of identity theft is fraud involving 
a deceased individual, which victimizes grieving families. Our 
subcommittee learned about a family that not only lost their young 
daughter to a terrible cancer--but then was dealt another blow when 
they found that their child's identity had been stolen and used to 
collect a fraudulent tax refund.
  Our bill aims to stop this fraud in its tracks. It is named in honor 
of the child whose family asked our Subcommittee to make sure what 
happened to them did not happen to another family: the ``Alexis Agin 
Identity Theft Protection Act of 2013.'' No one should have to endure 
both the loss of a loved one and then the financial stress of dealing 
with identity theft because a fraudster has appropriated the person's 
identity.
  The Death Master File, DMF, a prime source of SSNs used in identity 
theft, is a database of death information reported to the Social 
Security Administration, SSA. However, a lawsuit forced SSA to make 
this database available to anyone who wants it. SSA needs this 
information--it is used to make sure earned benefits from the Social 
Security Trust Fund are only paid to the living. But SSA does not want 
to make it available to fraudsters, and they should not be required to 
do so.
  Our bill would restrict access to the DMF to legitimate users and 
release to the general public only death data that is older than three 
years, at which point it is relatively useless to ID thieves bent on 
using it for fraud. Over time, our bill also enables the States to take 
back the responsibility of handling their death data and ends SSA's 
public release of the DMF for good. The President's budget proposes a 
similar approach that the Joint Committee on Taxation projects would 
save $793 million over ten years by reducing the potential for 
fraudulent tax refunds. The National Taxpayer Advocate and the SSA 
Inspector General have also called for the public release of the DMF 
data to end.
  I applaud the bipartisan approach we took to resolving this problem 
for the American people. I hope we can learn from the Agin family's 
tragic experience and move swiftly to enact this bipartisan, 
commonsense measure to reduce the harm of identity theft.

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