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IP: The Postal Service Has Its Eye on You
From: David Farber <dave () farber net>
Date: Sun, 22 Jul 2001 10:14:02 -0400
Date: Sun, 22 Jul 2001 00:23:38 -0400 To: Dave Farber <farber () cis upenn edu> From: Monty Solomon <monty () roscom com> Subject: The Postal Service Has Its Eye on You THE POSTAL SERVICE HAS ITS EYE ON YOU By John Berlau July 14, 2001 Since 1997, the U.S. Postal Service has been conducting a customer-surveillance program, 'Under the Eagle's Eye,' and reporting innocent activity to federal law enforcement. Could you already be a victim? http://www.moreprivacy.com/editorials/postaleye.htm
<snip> One thing that should set off alarms, the postal service says, is a customer objecting to filling out an 8105-A form that requests their date of birth, occupation and drivers license or other government-issued ID for a purchase of money orders of $3,000 or more. If they cancel the purchase or request a smaller amount, the clerk automatically should fill out Form 8105-B, the suspicious-activity report. Whatever the reason, any customer who switches from a transaction that requires an 8105-A form to one that doesnt should earn himself or herself the honor of being described on a B form, the training manual says. But the suspicious customers might just be concerned about privacy, says Solveig Singleton, a senior analyst at the Competitive Enterprise Institute. And a professional criminal likely would know that $3,000 was the reporting requirement before he walked into the post office. I think theres a lot of reasons that people might not want to fill out such forms; they may simply think its none of the post offices business, Singleton tells Insight. The presumption seems to be that from the standpoint of the post office and the Bank Secrecy regulators every citizen is a suspect. Both Singleton and Nojeim say Under the Eagles Eye unfairly targets the poor, minorities and immigrants people outside of the traditional banking system. A large proportion of the reports will be immigrants sending money back home, Nojeim says. Singleton adds, It lends itself to discrimination against people who are sort of marginally part of the ordinary banking system or who may not trust things like checks and credit cards. <snip> For archives see: http://www.interesting-people.org/
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- IP: The Postal Service Has Its Eye on You David Farber (Jul 22)