Replies to U.S. Postal Service dislikes anonymous mail [fs][priv]

[Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>]

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Date: Tue, 28 Oct 2003 22:34:32 -0500
To: Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>
From: Robert Moskowitz <rgm-int () htt-consult com>
Subject: Re: [Politech] U.S. Postal Service doesn't like anonymous
  physical mail [fs][priv]
In-Reply-To: <6.0.0.22.2.20031028092712.0220ec40 () mail well com>

Have you given any thought to what it would take to really have this work?

Everyone would need a tempus-class mail signer that had a digital cert from 
some trusted root.

They would have to put a unique number on the mailing (160 bits, probably) 
and then use the signer to create a digital sig of that number and this 
would also be on the mail.

Just about anything else could be forged.

Nah, even this really doesn't work.  The PO would have to keep a log of all 
these numbers and make sure they were never reused, to avoid spoofing of 
even them.....

So ANYTHING they do is just window-dressing and a money sink.

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Date: Tue, 28 Oct 2003 13:36:06 -0500
To: Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>
From: Stephen Cobb <scobb () cobb com>
Subject: Re: [Politech] U.S. Postal Service doesn't like anonymous
  physical mail [fs][priv]
In-Reply-To: <6.0.0.22.2.20031028092712.0220ec40 () mail well com>

FYI

A back-door form of sender identification has already been put in place for 
packages. You are not supposed to put Priority Mail packages over one pound 
into mailboxes without a post office metered stamp.

I tried this recently when sending out review copies of my book, 
accidentally. I used Priority Mail, which is $3.85 regardless of weight if 
you use a pre-printed envelope. The book weighs under 1 lb so I was sure I 
was okay, but I later found that the post office scale said each package 
was 1.1lbs. I found this out because several days later the packages were 
delivered to my box at the post office, as opposed to being delivered to 
the friends and clients to whom I addressed them. I then had to go to the 
counter and have the postal employee place a metered stamp in the value of 
$0.0 on the packages.

This is not a trivial regulation. This particular variation on postal 
stupidity ruins the otherwise bright idea of fixed rate Priority Mail. Used 
to be, if the stuff you were mailing fit into the pre-printed Priority Mail 
envelope you could slap $3.85 on the thing and drop it in a box, pretty 
much regardless of weight. Quick and easy. But apparently, like my nail 
clippers, a threat to national security.

Stephen

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