The 10 Most Dangerous Places For Your SSN

Getting your credit card number stolen is one thing, but when your Social Security number (SSN) is lifted, identity theft really hits home. And as it turns out, some places are more risky than others for storing your SSNs.

Identity theft expert Robert Siciliano, commissioned by McAfee, analyzed reported data breaches during the past year-and-a-half to determine the most dangerous places to give out your SSN: The No. 1 location is universities and colleges, which experienced 108 data breaches involving SSNs between January 2009 and October of this month. Banking and financial institutions were close behind, with 96 such breaches.

Siciliano's pulled his data from breaches published by the Identity Theft Resource Center, Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, and the Open Security Foundation during that period. More than 30 percent of all identity theft victims have had their SSN exposed, according to Javelin Research.

The rest of the top 10 is: