New Medicare ID Cards will be arriving this year. Currently, Medicare cards include the beneficiary’s Social Security number. To reduce the risk of fraud and identity theft, CMS is issuing new cards that replace the Social Security number with a randomly assigned Medicare Beneficiary Identifier. This is good news for anyone concerned with security, but the transition may lead to confusion. Here’s what you need to know to make the process go as smoothly as possible.      

Identity theft is a serious problem in the modern world. To minimize the risk, people are warned to keep sensitive information private – but that’s difficult to do when your Social Security Number is written on your Medicare card. This is why CMS will start issuing new Medicare cards that do not include Social Security Numbers.