The University's plan to replace Social Security numbers as forms of student identification is underway. At its meeting Tuesday, Student Council passed a bill to implement alternative forms of student identification.
Vice President of Organizations Greg Jackson said students have been concerned about the mass fraud and mass identity theft that has occurred at other major universities across the country.
Recently, computer hackers illegally gained access to Social Security numbers at the University of California, Berkeley.
"Basically, students walked up to the Council office with concerns about mass fraud and mass identity theft," Jackson said. Second-year Engineering student "Mark Hopke was one of them, and he said, 'Let's look into it.' Now we're just kind of moving with it."
Jackson said Hopke has been assisting Council with the legislation and the entire process.
Council's next step is to meet with the University Registrar to see how fast the process conducted, Jackson said. They also are going to meet with Information Technology and Communications officials.
"We need to see how it can be done with the whole ISIS transition," he said. "We're just meeting with anyone we can."
Shirley Payne, ITC director for security coordination and policy, said the University is concerned about the safety of using Social Security numbers as means of student identification.
"First off, the administration at the University recognizes that the use of Social Security numbers as identifiers is a growing concern," Payne said. "They have been concerned about it for a long time. When ISIS was developed in the early 1990s, hacking wasn't really a concern."
Payne said moving away from Social Security numbers will be a complex and very expensive issue.
"One complex issue is that even if we moved away from Social Security numbers, there are still outside entities that require that as an identifier, some of the testing services for example," Payne said.
Payne said ISIS needs to be replaced before the process can really begin.
"We need to replace ISIS, which will be a multi-year process," Payne said. "It takes a movement from a lot of different entities. I am certain that the new system will not use [Social Security] numbers as an identifier. It is going to take a massive effort to replace ISIS."
She added that she believes the University will jumpstart the process in the meantime.
"The University has always taken the steps they can and will continue to do so," she said. "For example, the Social Security number used to be on Student ID cards, and the University has eliminated that."
Jackson said he foresees it being an extensive, long-term process.
Payne said ITC and University officials will continue moving forward with the process.
"I'm sure we'll continue to have a dialogue about this," Payne said. "Everyone has concern about identity theft."
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