Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

When a public representative or some other third party rings the Department on behalf of somebody, staff in the Department have to follow a standard procedure to ascertain that the person in question has the authority to act in that manner. Given that 1.8 million phone calls are received each year, or 35,000 a week, it is clear that a significant proportion of the Department's public services is conducted over the telephone. Standard checks are requested. In this case, one staff member of the Department was duped by people who were able to supply the PPS numbers of individuals and perhaps other information relating to those individuals. That allowed them to be extremely convincing. The Deputy referred to Irish Water. Social welfare legislation specifies that PPS numbers can be used by certain specified bodies, such as Irish Water, only for the purposes of public service transactions. Irish Water cannot use PPS numbers for any other purposes. That is set down in law.

The Social Welfare Consolidation Act provides that it is an offence to use PPS numbers in a manner not provided for under that Act. A person convicted of same can receive a significant fine or a term of imprisonment.

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