So last night I was at DC401 (And if you visit the page linked you’ll see an image of Kevin Ker-Mitnick.) for an interesting presentation on Social Security numbers. I know, I know, sounds boring but interesting to the geeks among us.

Because you see if you know two things about a person, their place of birth and date (Month/Day) of birth you can determine the first three digits also know as the Area Number or AN, and the next two numbers known as the Group Number or GN.

And using a bit of regressive analysis you can get within about 40% of the way through the Serial Number or SN. And you can even fudge a little bit on a couple of the serial number digits and it’ll fly right through most systems.

The researchers who did this produced a paper on the topic and I really want to read it.

Anyhow

Anyhow prior to the discussion the topic of representatives and senators came up. The group was mostly early 20’s to early 30’s with me being the outlier at my advanced age.

But get this, they all can complain but NONE of them were registered to vote. I’ve got to work on that.

I pointed them to the Sec. of State’s page. At least maybe plant the seeds of dissent.

And the reference to Ker-Mitnick above, there’s a good chance he might be coming to QuahogCon in 2012! Hide the computers and phones!