EPIC Again Urges USDA to Abandon Proposed National SNAP Database That Threatens Privacy
EPIC has filed formal comments calling on the USDA to scrap its revised proposal for a National SNAP Information Database, which would centralize sensitive personal data on millions of food assistance applicants and recipients across the country. The civil liberties group argues the database would violate federal privacy law.
Why this matters: SNAP recipients are not a powerful constituency. They are people who need food assistance, and the government is proposing to collect their personal information into one giant centralized database. That kind of database does not stay quiet. It gets queried, shared, breached, and repurposed. People who apply for benefits should not have to hand over sensitive details to a system built for surveillance at scale. If the USDA cannot explain exactly what this database is for, who can access it, and what stops it from being misused, that is reason enough to kill the proposal.
Who should care: General readers · Privacy officers · Policy
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