The Internal Revenue Service has dropped a proposed regulation giving tax-exempt organizations the option of providing the Social Security Numbers of their donors.

The rule, which the IRS and the Treasury Department proposed last September, called on charities to ask for additional personal donor information, including Social Security numbers for any donation of $250 or more. Charities expressed concern about the proposal, and the National Council of Nonprofits called on many of them to submit comments to the IRS objecting to it. Nearly 38,000 comments were received as of Thursday, mostly objecting to the proposal.

Nonprofits have neither the financial resources nor sufficient staffing to combat hackers who will see an easy source for Social Security information. This also creates a liability nightmare for innocent nonprofits, to be asked to share their address, their credit card number and their Social Security number all in the same place would be enough to scare even the most committed donor to decline to give.

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