The Trump administration is shattering norms around the handling of Americans’ personal, and sometimes private, information — dismantling barriers around data in the name of government efficiency and rooting out fraud.

Privacy experts say the moves bring the country closer to a surveillance state, increase the government’s vulnerability to cyber-attacks and risk pushing people away from public services.

The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has sought — and almost always received — access to social security numbers, addresses, medical histories, tax histories, welfare benefits, bank accounts, immigration statuses and federal employee databases.

These moves have shattered walls that have long kept data within the agencies that collect it.

John Ackerly, a former technology policy adviser under former President George W. Bush and founder of data security firm Virtru, said government agencies need to strike a balance in handling data.

“Foundationally, more information being shared more widely can provide greater insight,” he said.

“Bureaucracy shuts down access to information,” he added. “But that does not mean that there should be unfettered access.”

Groups like the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) see the risk of abuse as outweighing any potential gains.

“We should be limiting federal agencies to access data about us only to the extent they need to perform their duties for the American people,” said Cody Venzke, senior policy counsel on surveillance, privacy and technology at the ACLU.

“There's no reason why these data silos need to be broken down,” he added.

Despite outrage from Democrats and some pushback from the courts, the Trump administration has charged ahead.

“President Trump signed an executive order keeping his promise to eliminate information silos and streamline data collection across all agencies to increase government efficiency and save hard-earned taxpayer dollars,” Taylor Rogers, a White House assistant press secretary, said in a statement.

Walls drop around data sharing

Trump’s

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