Security Number

While under scrutiny for issuing fraudulent driver's licenses on one front, the Motor Vehicle Administration is relaxing one of its identification requirements on another front in response to a motorist's privacy concerns.The MVA will stop forcing Marylanders to divulge their Social Security numbers when obtaining or renewing driver's licenses, based on a Severna Park woman's complaint that the number should be private.The agency will continue to ask for the number, but it now will take "no" for an answer, MVA Administrator W. Marshall Rickert said.

Unsolicited e-mails and phone calls from scammers, claiming to represent your local election board or civic group, are trying to trick you into sharing your Social Security, credit card or bank account number to confirm your eligibility or registration to vote, the Federal Trade Commission warned. As a rule, the FTC says, organizations conducting legitimate voter registration drives either contact you in person or give you a voter registration form that you fill out yourself. They will never ask you to provide financial information, the FTC says.

Members of the Maryland Association of Certified Public Accountants are answering readers' tax questions through April 15.Q.My wife and I are in the process of adopting a son, who has lived with us since February 1996. However, the adoption has not yet been finalized, and he doesn't have a Social Security number. Can we claim him as a dependent in 1996, or do we have to wait until he has a SS number and file an amended return?A. Yes, you can claim a 1996 dependency exemption, assuming the child was placed with you by an authorized placement agency for legal adoption.

A Northwest Baltimore man wanted in the fatal shootings of his girlfriend and her daughter 13 years ago was caught yesterday after a tip led authorities to a home in Washington, where the man was living under an alias, city police said. Darryl E. Green, 56, was arrested by members of the Regional Warrant Apprehension Task Force as he walked out of a home where he had been staying, according to Sgt. Roger Nolan, supervisor of the department's cold case squad. Police said Green had assumed the identity of a relative, using another man's Social Security number, birth date and other personal information to acquire driver's licenses in Washington and Virginia.

A federal grand jury has indicted a Baltimore County public school teacher from Middle River on charges of using a second Social Security number to defraud the government out of more than $180,000 in benefits, authorities said. Beverly J. Beard, 52, was arrested yesterday after being indicted Wednesday on four counts of Social Security fraud and making false statements. She illegally collected Supplemental Security Income, Medicaid and federal housing assistance payments, according to the U.S. attorney's office.

WASHINGTON - Congress is moving to replace the paper Social Security cards issued to 280 million Americans with plastic, harder-to-counterfeit versions to try to curtail identity theft and the use of Social Security cards and numbers by some undocumented immigrants to obtain jobs. Privacy and immigration advocates as well as business groups have concerns about the proposed cards. Critics fear they could become de facto national ID cards and eventually play the role that identity papers have played in repressive societies.

When an errant item showed up on Chantal Perreault's banking statement in October, she thought it was simply a misdirected payment. But as the Las Vegas resident delved into the details of the $700 deposit, she found that she had become another casualty of identity fraud. First there was the disputed banking deposit, then there were letters thanking her boyfriend for opening up credit accounts with J.C. Penney and Wal-Mart. A salesperson from Cingular called to find out why Perreault's boyfriend wanted to open two more accounts when he already had one with the cellular phone carrier.

The Q: From the local gym to the utility company, almost everyone wants your Social Security number before they'll do business with you. Some have a legitimate reason: for example, credit reporting agencies if you're checking your credit history or requesting a credit freeze. Some don't, like the electric company and phone company. Reader Dale Rains wondered whether all government agencies need the nine digits, too. More specifically, he wondered why he had to provide it to the Department of Assessments and Taxation to get the Maryland Homestead Tax Credit.

Deboul Jayson Kim, who also calls himself Jay Kim, wants to represent Towson in the Maryland House of Delegates. But he has a problem.The young resident of Towson's plush Penthouse condominium, who portrays himself as a conservative Republican, has trouble telling the truth about himself.First, he said in his campaign material that he was a student on leave from the Johns Hopkins University medical school. He even supplied a reporter with a Social Security number to prove it. The number, it turned out, does belong to a man named Kim who is a Hopkins medical student.