What the hell, Wisconsin?! The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel is reporting that for the second time in just over a year, the state of Wisconsin has printed mailing labels that display the social security numbers of the recipient.

Do you really need us to tell you that this is not cool?

About 260,000 participants in Medicaid programs were sent a recent mailing that included the recipients’ Social Security numbers above their names on the address labels, the state Department of Health and Family Services said Tuesday. The number included another digit and no dashes, so the digits might not be immediately recognized by many as a Social Security number, state officials said.

While 485,000 copies were supposed to go out, the mailing was stopped after a recipient caught the error, according to EDS Corp., the vendor responsible for processing the mailings. State officials said they learned of the mistake Monday night.

Jane Marvin, 66, of Sun Prairie said she was shocked to receive mail from the state with her Social Security number printed on it for the second time in a little over a year. Last year, she was one of 171,000 people who had sensitive information about them printed on the outside of tax booklets by the state Department of Revenue.

“I don’t care if you start with (Gov. Jim) Doyle or somebody else, but somebody’s not doing their job,” Marvin said Tuesday. “It shouldn’t have happened, not after the tax thing.”

Stop it, Wisconsin! We’re going to begin to distrust your fine cheese products and will stop drinking this amazing root beer. Ok, not really. But you should still stop putting your citizen’s SSNs on the outside of the envelope. Thanks.

Social Security digital déjà vu [JSOnline] (Thanks, Erik!)
(Photo:Zesmerelda)

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