President Trump has signed a law that gives Social Security 180 days to set up one point of contact for people whose Social Security number has been misused. A card lost in the mail is covered too. The White House notice describes the contact as one for people whose number has been misused or whose card has been lost.
The White House said the president signed H.R. 5345 on Wednesday, Oct. 7, 2026. The bill is titled the Improving Social Security’s Service to Victims of Identity Theft Act, and Rep. David Kustoff of the House introduced it, with Rep. Nicole Malliotakis as an additional sponsor.
What does the new law make Social Security do?
The law adds a new Section 714 to Title VII of the Social Security Act. It orders the Commissioner of Social Security to establish and carry out procedures so that each covered person has a single point of contact until the problem is resolved. The bill text says that contact “shall consist of a team or subset of specially trained employees.”
Anyone who has had a number stolen should know where the responsibility will sit once the law is in force. The answer is a trained team at the agency, not the victim, who must keep explaining the case to a new employee on every call. Until then, the agency’s existing process still applies.
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Who is covered, and does a lost card count?
The law reaches two kinds of cases. The first is a person whose Social Security number has been misused, including to fraudulently obtain benefits under Title II (retirement, survivors and disability), Title VIII (Special Veterans Benefits) or Title XVI (Supplemental Security Income), or in a way that affects Social Security’s records.
In plain terms, a stolen number used to collect someone’s retirement or disability check, a stolen number used to claim SSI, and a number misused in a way that changes the victim’s file at the agency all fall in the first category.
The second is a person whose Social Security card was lost “in the course of transmission to the individual.” The plainest example is a replacement card that disappears in the mail. That means a card that never reaches its owner qualifies for the same single contact as a case of full identity theft.
When does the single contact start?
The bill says the change “shall take effect 180 days after the date of enactment.” Because the president signed it on Oct. 7, the clock is running now. Social Security has not announced the date the team will open, the phone number for it, or how a victim will be routed to it.
Rep. Kustoff’s office announced the bill’s passage in a press release. No Public Law number has been published for the act yet, so a citation by number is not available.
What can a victim do before the contact exists?
Nothing in the law needs to be waited on. Social Security runs a scam-reporting page for people who believe their number was used or who were contacted by someone pretending to be the agency. A victim who reports now creates a record that the new team will inherit after the 180 days run out.
What stays open is how fast the agency moves. The statute sets the interval and says the contact can be a team or a subset of specially trained employees, which leaves the staffing size to the Commissioner. It does not fix a headcount, and the first real test is whether one trained team answers the first call from a stolen-number victim without a transfer.
Is someone using a Social Security number right now?
The new single contact is months away, and a stolen number does its damage in the first hours: new accounts, redirected benefits, letters that arrive after the harm is done. Waiting for an agency team leaves that window open.
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More Financial Reading
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This article was produced with AI assistance and edited for accuracy against the sources linked above.
