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DOGE aims to pool federal data, putting personal information at risk

Washington Post. May 7, 2025
By Hannah Natanson, Joseph Menn, Lisa Rein and Rachel Siegel

Economic Policy
DOGE aims to pool federal data, putting personal information at risk
The goal — a centralized system with unprecedented access to data about Social Security, taxes, medical diagnoses and other private information — would create a multitude of vulnerabilities, experts say.

The U.S. DOGE Service is racing to build a single centralized database with vast troves of personal information about millions of U.S. citizens and residents, a campaign that often violates or disregards core privacy and security protections meant to keep such information safe, government workers say.

The team overseen by Elon Musk is collecting data from across the government, sometimes at the urging of low-level aides, according to multiple federal employees and a former DOGE staffer, who all spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals. The intensifying effort to unify systems into one central hub aims to advance multiple Trump administration priorities, including finding and deporting undocumented immigrants and rooting out fraud in government payments. And it follows a March executive order to eliminate “information silos” as DOGE tries to streamline operations and cut spending.


At several agencies, DOGE officials have sought to merge databases that had long been kept separate, federal workers said. For example, longtime Musk lieutenant Steve Davis told staffers at the Social Security Administration that they would soon start linking various sources of Social Security data for access and analysis, according to a person briefed on the conversations, with a goal of “joining all data across government.” Davis did not respond to a request for comment.

But DOGE has also sometimes removed protections around sensitive information — on Social Security numbers, birth dates, employment history, disability records, medical documentation and more. In one instance, a website for a new visa program wasn’t set up behind a protective virtual private network as would be customary, according to a Department of Homeland Security employee and records obtained by The Washington Post.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2025/05/07/doge-government-data-immigration-social-security/

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem's bag, including $3,000 in cash is stolen from DC restaurant

Source: CNN

https://www.cnn.com/2025/04/21/politics/homeland-security-kristi-noem-purse-stolen/index.html

Read more: https://www.cnn.com/2025/04/21/politics/homeland-security-kristi-noem-purse-stolen/index.html

people "will assume America can't be trusted."

That disregard for normal security procedures will “cause allies to be very reluctant to share analysis and intelligence,” said Ben Hodges, former commander of U.S. forces in Europe. Barring major change, people “will assume America can’t be trusted.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/25/world/europe/signal-jeffrey-goldberg-message-hegseth.html

As rare "business woman" I was asked to leave a hotel bar (waiting for my coworkers) in 1970. It was humiliating.

This happened to me. I was in IT and wasn't a lawyer so was not aware of the legal violations.

I was dressed in a business suit, with a briefcase. Arranged to meet my coworkers at the hotel bar. Think it was the Chicago Sheraton. I was asked to leave. Told they didn't allow unescorted women into the bar. Realized they must have thought I was a hooker? Ah well, I waited in the lobby for my coworkers and then we entered and had a drink before dinner. I've never told anyone about this before now. Just too humiliated.

N.Y. Today: A toast to history-making women
https://www.nytimes.com/section/nyregion?campaign_id=44&emc=edit_ur_20241024&instance_id=137663&nl=new-york-today&regi_id=18693213&segment_id=181234&user_id=7329b58d5a1101c62af603ab73ee0c1b

JD Vance still holds the view about childless women.

JD Vance clarifies and updates his 2021 comments disparaging “childless cat ladies” to make it clear that he meant no disrespect to cats, but he did mean to demean women and still holds the view in 2024 that they should be punished for not having children

Just "learned" that George Soros is funding ALL the campus protests and

That when authorities shut one of the protests down, he moves the actors to another site to protest. Apparently he moved the Columbia protests to Las Vegas recently.

A Faux News watcher told me this.

Best free QR Code reader for iPad?

An Open Letter to Governor Lee on the Slaughter of Our Children

NASHVILLE — Dear Gov. Bill Lee,

For more than 24 hours, I waited for you to speak to the people of Tennessee about the massacre of Nashville schoolchildren and the adults who gave their lives trying to keep them safe. These were your citizens. These children were your children. This shattered faith community is exactly the kind of community that gives you solace in your own moments of fear and despair. What would you say to them? To us?

What promises of reform would you offer? What vows before God that nothing like this would ever happen to another family on your watch? To another innocent child?

I waited to hear.

I have never had any reason to believe that you would represent my own views and my own values in the governance of this state, but I still had hope that the murder of children would have the power, however temporarily, to carry us to common ground. God help me, I still had enough faith in your humanity to hope that you might be moved by the obliterated bodies of these tiny Tennesseans to do something. To lead us somewhere better. At the very least to promise that you would try.

For more than 24 hours, you did not speak.

I live in a quiet neighborhood. In that quiet, it is possible to hear sirens from miles away. When the sirens started Monday, I was standing in my front yard talking to a friend. At first I didn’t even register the keening, but almost immediately it became an uncountable number of sirens. Police sirens and fire engine sirens and the heart-chilling sound of ambulance sirens.

Here is a link to the letter without the NYT paywall.

https://dnyuz.com/2023/03/29/an-open-letter-to-governor-lee-on-the-slaughter-of-our-children/

Russian Invasion of Ukraine - Russian Forces Retreat From Lyman

Source: New York Times

Here’s what we know:

The loss of the strategic rail hub in the east is particularly poorly timed for the Kremlin after its internationally derided illegal annexation of four Ukrainian regions.

Russia’s withdrawal from Lyman comes a day after Putin said he was annexing the region.

Broken glass, blown-out tires and a crater show the violence of a deadly attack in Zaporizhzhia.

At least 24 are dead, including 13 children, in an attack on a convoy in northeastern Ukraine, the authorities say.

Here’s why Russia’s retreat from Lyman matters.

Russia has detained the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant’s director general, its operator says.

Intercepted calls reveal the Russian army in disarray.

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/live/2022/10/01/world/russia-ukraine-war-news