USC - Disclosure of information in possession of Social Security Administration or Department of Health and Human Services

View all text of Part A [§ 1301 - § 1320b-26]

§ 1306. Disclosure of information in possession of Social Security Administration or Department of Health and Human Services

(a) Disclosure prohibited; exceptions

(1) No disclosure of any return or portion of a return (including information returns and other written statements) filed with the Commissioner of Internal Revenue under title VIII of the Social Security Act or under subchapter E of chapter 1 or subchapter A of chapter 9 of the Internal Revenue Code [of 1939], or under regulations made under authority thereof, which has been transmitted to the head of the applicable agency by the Commissioner of Internal Revenue, or of any file, record, report, or other paper, or any information, obtained at any time by the head of the applicable agency or by any officer or employee of the applicable agency in the course of discharging the duties of the head of the applicable agency under this chapter, and no disclosure of any such file, record, report, or other paper, or information, obtained at any time by any person from the head of the applicable agency or from any officer or employee of the applicable agency, shall be made except as the head of the applicable agency may by regulations prescribe and except as otherwise provided by Federal law. Any person who shall violate any provision of this section shall be deemed guilty of a felony and, upon conviction thereof, shall be punished by a fine not exceeding $10,000 for each occurrence of a violation, or by imprisonment not exceeding 5 years, or both.

(2) For purposes of this subsection and subsection (b), the term “applicable agency” means—

(A) the Social Security Administration, with respect to matter transmitted to or obtained by such Administration or matter disclosed by such Administration, or

(B) the Department of Health and Human Services, with respect to matter transmitted to or obtained by such Department or matter disclosed by such Department.

(b) Requests for information and services

(d) Compliance with requestsNotwithstanding any other provision of this section, in any case in which—

(1) information regarding whether an individual is shown on the records of the Commissioner of Social Security as being alive or deceased is requested from the Commissioner for purposes of epidemiological or similar research which the Commissioner in consultation with the Secretary of Health and Human Services finds may reasonably be expected to contribute to a national health interest, and

(2) the requester agrees to reimburse the Commissioner for providing such information and to comply with limitations on safeguarding and rerelease or redisclosure of such information as may be specified by the Commissioner,

the Commissioner shall comply with such request, except to the extent that compliance with such request would constitute a violation of the terms of any contract entered into under section 405(r) of this title.

(e) Public inspectionNotwithstanding any other provision of this section the Secretary shall make available to each State agency operating a program under subchapter XIX and shall, subject to the limitations contained in subsection (e),1

1 So in original. Probably should be subsection “(f),”.

make available for public inspection in readily accessible form and fashion, the following official reports (not including, however, references to any internal tolerance rules and practices that may be contained therein, internal working papers or other informal memoranda) dealing with the operation of the health programs established by subchapters XVIII and XIX—

(1) individual contractor performance reviews and other formal evaluations of the performance of carriers, intermediaries, and State agencies, including the reports of follow-up reviews;

(2) comparative evaluations of the performance of such contractors, including comparisons of either overall performance or of any particular aspect of contractor operation; and

(3) program validation survey reports and other formal evaluations of the performance of providers of services, including the reports of follow-up reviews, except that such reports shall not identify individual patients, individual health care practitioners, or other individuals.

(f) Opportunity for review

(g) Agreement with Secretary of the TreasuryNotwithstanding any other provision of this section, the Commissioner of Social Security shall enter into an agreement with the Secretary of the Treasury under which—

(1) if the Secretary provides the Commissioner with the information described in section 6103(k)(15) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 with respect to any individual, the Commissioner shall indicate to the Secretary as to whether such individual receives disability insurance benefits under section 423 of this title or supplemental security income benefits under subchapter XVI of this chapter (including State supplementary payments of the type referred to in section 1382e(a) of this title or payments of the type described in section 212(a) of Public Law 93–66 [42 U.S.C. 1382 note]);

(2) appropriate safeguards are included to assure that the indication described in paragraph (1) will be used solely for the purpose of determining if tax receivables involving such individual are not eligible for collection pursuant to a qualified tax collection contract by reason of section 6306(d)(3)(E) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986; and

(3) the Secretary shall pay the Commissioner of Social Security the full costs (including systems and administrative costs) of providing the indication described in paragraph (1).

(Aug. 14, 1935, ch. 531, title XI, § 1106, as added Aug. 10, 1939, ch. 666, title VIII, § 802, 53 Stat. 1398; amended Aug. 28, 1950, ch. 809, title IV, § 403(d), 64 Stat. 559; Pub. L. 85–840, title VII, § 701, Aug. 28, 1958, 72 Stat. 1055; Pub. L. 89–97, title I, § 108(c), title III, § 340, July 30, 1965, 79 Stat. 339, 411; Pub. L. 90–248, title I, § 168, title II, § 241(c)(1), Jan. 2, 1968, 81 Stat. 875, 917; Pub. L. 92–603, title II, § 249C(a), Oct. 30, 1972, 86 Stat. 1428; Pub. L. 93–647, § 101(d), Jan. 4, 1975, 88 Stat. 2360; Pub. L. 97–35, title XXII, § 2207, Aug. 13, 1981, 95 Stat. 838; Pub. L. 98–369, div. B, title VI, § 2663(j)(2)(D)(ii), (l), July 18, 1984, 98 Stat. 1170, 1171; Pub. L. 103–296, title I, § 108(b)(2)–(5), title III, §§ 311(a), 313(a), Aug. 15, 1994, 108 Stat. 1481, 1482, 1525, 1530; Pub. L. 116–260, div. N, title II, § 283(a), div. FF, title I, § 102(a), Dec. 27, 2020, 134 Stat. 1984, 3083.)