[Foundation-l] Where we are headed

[Michael Snow]

Anthere wrote:

> Dunno what are SSN's and EIN...

SSN = Social Security Number
Used as an identifying number for US citizens (and legal residents) in a 
lot of settings, especially financial. Knowledge of someone's number has 
great potential to allow identity theft, so should not be published 
under any circumstances.
EIN = Employer Identification Number
Assigned mostly to corporations for tax purposes. Not used for as many 
other things as an SSN, so there's a lot less potential for misuse. One 
use of interest to us is that if a company has a charitable giving 
program in which employees can have an amount withheld from their 
paychecks to the charity of their choice, the company would need the 
charity's EIN. I'm not aware of any serious problem for a nonprofit 
publishing this number (the American Red Cross publishes theirs on their 
website). In fact, I've suggested putting ours out there in order to 
make it easier for companies to add us to gift-matching programs, but 
I'm not aware that this has been done yet.

--Michael Snow