The Facts of SSN
by Kermit the Hog
The Social Security number (SSN) is a number used by the government to tell us apart from each other, as well as a method of giving us a guarantee of retirement funds.
Many companies now use your SSN as an identification number, and to check with the government to confirm that you are who you say you are.
On to the good stuff - the number: 078-05-1120
The SSA used this as a sample number back during ad campaigns, and you can use it too. I'll be using it as an example, but this used to be a popular method of SSN forgery. The IRS and any government official will recognize it, but most people have probably never heard of it.
We'll start with the first three digits: 078
These three digits, the state combo, represents (you guessed it) the state in which the SSN was applied for. 078, if you check on the list below, is within the realm of New York. On to the next digits.
The second set of digits is 05, the group combo. This is just a way for the government to keep track of the SSNs more efficiently. It can also give an estimate of how early in the year the card holder was born.
There is a strict order in which this combo progresses. It begins with odd numbers, 01 to 09, followed by even numbers, 10 to 98. This is usually as far as it goes, and I would never pick a number much more than 50 for the center.
Be wary, though. Try to make your group combo coincide with the birthday that you are using.
A guide would be that 01 to 09 will be assigned, along with 10 to 16 within the first 3 months of the year, usually. 18 to 36 is a good estimate for the next three, and 38 to 50 is an average for the third three months. 50 to 62 is a reasonable estimate for any remaining cards.
But if the last three months are above 50, why don't you recommend those, you may ask. I don't recommend using them because you have no guarantee that the state you are choosing had that many people apply in the year you have chosen.
Some years it has gone into the next section, even numbers, 02 to 08, but some years it has only gotten to about 44. I would strongly recommend either trying to get that year's SSN application amount (a difficult task, I am sure) or just staying low and using an early fake birthday.
In preparation for the future, the Social Security Agency (SSA) has created the third and fourth groups, the third being mentioned above (even numbers, 02 to 08) and the fourth, odd numbers, 11 to 99.
The last four numbers in the SSN are 1120. This is just a random sequence. Some believe that they are assigned in order, starting from 1001 and going up. I have not seen, however, any proof of this.
Now that you have an idea of the underlying structure of an SSN , here are the states and their coinciding numbers. The first list is by state, the second is by number.
U.S. States
Numerical Ordering