The Internal Revenue Service has proposed regulations allowing truncated Taxpayer Identification Numbers on the Form W-2 to help protect people’s Social Security Numbers from identity theft.

The proposed regulations enable employers to voluntarily truncate their employees’ SSNs on copies of the Form W-2, Wage and Tax Statement, given to employees so the truncated SSNs appear in the form of IRS truncated taxpayer identification numbers, or TTINs.

The proposed rules would also amend the regulations under section 6109 of the tax code to clarify the application of the truncation rules to Forms W-2, adding an example illustrating how the rules could be applied.

The proposed amendments also would delete some obsolete provisions and update cross-references in the existing regulations.

The IRS is asking for comments on the proposed regulations by Dec. 18, 2017.

