According to Bloomberg, the U.S. Social Security Administration (SSA) recently welcomed a 10-member special investigation team, dispatched by the Department of Government Effectiveness (DOGE) led by Elon Musk, to investigate the possible phenomenon of "social security for the deceased" in the social security system. Musk previously claimed that there may be tens of millions of deceased people still receiving public benefits in the U.S. Social Security system, calling it "the largest Ponzi scheme in history."
According to the latest statement filed with the federal court, the DOGE team has begun work within the Social Security Administration. The team includes four special government employees and six DOGE staff seconded from other departments. Their primary mission is to investigate possible waste, fraud and abuse within the Social Security Administration.
The main responsibility of the stationed staff is to check the compliance of social security benefit payments. In particular, seven DOGE team members were granted access to a database of U.S. Social Security number holders known as Numident in order to look for potential fraud. The database records Social Security numbers for millions of people, but sometimes has missing dates of death. Musk once cited this, pointing out that there are still more than 20 million "elderly" people over 100 years old receiving Social Security.
But critics say Musk's move could intensify pressure for cuts to Social Security programs and worry his team's investigation could lead to the misuse of sensitive personal data. Opponents also point out that although data from the Social Security Administration shows that the amount of improper payments between 2015 and 2022 is close to $72 billion, these funds are not entirely due to fraud, and most of the amounts have been recovered.
Musk's comments and measures triggered some nervous reactions within the Social Security Administration. Leland Dudek, an anti-fraud expert at the Social Security Administration, said that the missing death date in the Numident database does not mean that Social Security payments are still continuing. These payment data are managed by another database, the "Master Beneficiary Record." The Social Security Administration said it is actively correcting inconsistencies related to missing death dates.
In addition, the "death data" within the Social Security Bureau also received special attention. In addition to Numident, the Social Security Administration maintains a master death file containing more than 94 million death reports. Dudek pointed out that supplementing and correcting death data is one of the priorities of the Social Security Administration, and ensuring compliance with payments is its core mission.
The scope of the DOGE team's investigation is not limited to the Social Security Administration. Two team members have been granted access to the state's new hire directory, a database managed by the Department of Health and Human Services and used to enforce child support orders. In addition, a DOGE member will soon be dispatched to the Small Business Administration to further expand the scope of the investigation.