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USPS Informed Delivery – Digital Images of Front of Mailpieces
- koolba 10y agoI bet they already have to do this for the NSA / CIA / FBI so why not profit from it as well as a separate product that people will pay extra for? Genius!
- sallyfour 10y agoIt's free.
- koolba 10y ago> It's free. For now sure but there's no reason this couldn't be a premium service down the road. Heck, I'd pay for it if it allowed me to access it programmatically, process the cover images to filter junk mail, and have them (for an added fee / driven by API) shred them for me. If anyone wants to try building it that idea out let me know. I'll beta test.
- jonknee 10y agoThis is already a service and has been for a long time: https://www.earthclassmail.com/ https://www.earthclassmail.com/
- thinkling 10y agoI looked at that years ago and found enough complaints about it thatI picked a lower-tech service. Be sure to do some research before you try it.
- xiangmin 10y agoA positive testimony here for Earth Class Mail. Using them for several years now. It seems like they were in difficult times maybe five years ago. Since then, they went through a re-org, found a new CEO, and are by all signs doing well. New addresses and features added periodically. They regularly ship (forward) for us internationally too.
- thinkling 10y agoGood to know, thanks!
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- eli 10y agoYes, in fact they do: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/04/us/monitoring-of-snail-mail.html http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/04/us/monitoring-of-snail-mai... Though I'm sure the primary purpose of scanning envelopes is, ya know, to see where they're going.
- dang 10y agoWould you please stop posting unsubstantive comments to HN? If you have a substantive point to make, make it thoughtfully; otherwise please don't comment until you do.
- koolba 10y agoGiven that I'm not the only one in this thread pointing out that the source of this offering is most likely driven from features designed for three-letter agencies, I'd argue my comment was substantive (though I'll give you the point that it was written a bit cheekily).
- pwg 10y agoWhile certainly useful to three letter agencies, the original reason for imaging the front of mail-pieces is for mail routing. The mail-pieces that don't have routing bar-codes in the address areas get fed to an OCR system to read the address data (with a fallback to humans for the last few that OCR can't read) so the computer system knows where to route the mail-piece. In order to read the address text via. OCR one needs an image of the front of the envelope to feed to the OCR system. This new offering is just leveraging that scanning process that has been in place for a very long time. The biggest difference might be that previously the image went from scan to OCR to deletion and instead now they've decided to replace "delete" with "store" to make this new offering feasible.
- koolba 10y ago> This new offering is just leveraging that scanning process that has been in place for a very long time. The biggest difference might be that previously the image went from scan to OCR to deletion and instead now they've decided to replace "delete" with "store" to make this new offering feasible. And with my tinfoil hat on, I'm saying it's probably driven by requests from three-letter agencies. We already know they scan the covers not just for automated processing (which as you mention wouldn't require saving the image after the OCR is complete), but to also provide it to law enforcement. If public pressure is forcing those agencies to be more forthright with what data they're collecting and storing, it conceivable for them to push that responsibility upstream. If the USPS is going to be imaging and storing everyone's mail, there's no need for other agencies to do so. They can just access it on the fly. Arguably, the government would save money with this approach as well as I'm sure all three major agencies would want a full copy the data set.
- msumpter 10y agoMail covers[1] are a very old surveillance technique and mail isolation control and tracking/MICP[2] has been standard on all parcels since early 2000s 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mail_cover https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mail_cover 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mail_Isolation_Control_and_Tracking https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mail_Isolation_Control_and_Tra...
- saycheese 10y agoUSPS has been taking images of the mail for years [1]. All the images of the service are emailed to the user and are not secure. [1] https://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/08/03/us/postal-service-confirms-photographing-all-us-mail.html https://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/08/03/us/postal-service-conf...
- sonar_un 10y agoThe USPS shut down Outbox for this same service. https://www.forbes.com/sites/theopriestley/2015/12/08/usps-launches-exactly-the-same-digital-service-it-killed-in-startup-outbox/#7ac9c6954622 https://www.forbes.com/sites/theopriestley/2015/12/08/usps-l... Still, though, I would really like this service. I travel quite a bit and I would hate to miss important pieces of mail.
- ghaff 10y agoI guess. I travel quite a bit as well. But anything that's genuinely important probably isn't going to come unexpectedly through USPS. I suppose I can construct scenarios where I'm waiting for something and want to see if I need to chase it down while I'm away for a couple weeks but that's sort of contrived. If they're storing them anyway, it probably makes sense that people should have access to stored information about them though.
- hueving 10y ago>But anything that's genuinely important probably isn't going to come unexpectedly through USPS. Any notice from government offices comes this way. And usually the important notices are ones that weren't expected. :(
- ghaff 10y agoFair enough. But if I'm traveling and see I received mail from the IRS or whoever, it's not like there's much I can do about it until I get home. (Yes, I can call someone and ask them to get my mail and tell me what it is but if it's something serious I probably don't want a random neighbor reading it anyway.)
- paulsutter 10y agoIf you got an IRS notice you could call the IRS
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- dangerboysteve 10y agoon one hand it's seems like a nice feature but I can't help but to think this is clever marketing spin for a surveillance backed project.
- jonknee 10y agoAnd on yet another hand it's obvious you can't deliver mail at $.49 a pop without heavy doses of automation. Surveillance or not, the USPS will be taking images of your mail.
- dsl 10y agoEverything sent via USPS is already scanned and put into a surveillance system (Google for "mail cover"). This product is likely a result of the data collected from the surveillance project, not the other way around.
- code_duck 10y agoThey use OCR to interpret as many addresses as possible, then resort to sending digital images of difficult labels to remote centers to be read by a human. See http://www.atlasobscura.com/places/usps-remote-encoding-facility http://www.atlasobscura.com/places/usps-remote-encoding-faci... So, of course they have images of all your mail. Also, it's been known for some time that the federal government collects data on mail, like emails and phone calls. This article covers that, from 2013... https://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/07/04/us/monitoring-of-snail-mail.html https://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/07/04/us/monitoring-of-snail... and it involves this program, which apparently exists for legitimate business purposes, but the data is also used for surveillance: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mail_Isolation_Control_and_Tracking https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mail_Isolation_Control_and_T...
- nostromo 10y agoThe one thing I'd like to pay the post office for is to stop delivery to my house. If my mailbox were a Gmail inbox it'd be 98% spam, 2% government. And yet, it's a Gmail inbox I can't close.
- pwg 10y agoThe USPS would never offer that feature. They get directly paid [1] to deliver that spam, so providing you a 'cutoff' method directly effects their bottom line because the sender will not want to pay for items that never get delivered. But I do agree, it would be a nice feature to have a "no junk mail" switch that could be turned on. [1] I believe they do not charge a high enough price for the junk, but they do get paid to deliver it in any case.
- philsnow 10y agoThere was https://www.google.com/contributor https://www.google.com/contributor , where you would pay them a monthly fee and they wouldn't serve google ad network ads to you. USPS could do the same thing. $1-2 / month for mail delivery service?
- cr0sh 10y agoHave you tried this?: 1. Get a box (not too large - just small enough to fit thru the door of the post offices package box - or better, use one of the USPS free shipping boxes) 2. Collect the junk mail, and put it in the box, sans any identifying information (this is important!) 3. As you collect the junk mail, keep back one of the pre-paid envelopes sent with some junk mail. 4. When the box is full, tape it up, and tape or glue the pre-paid envelope to the front. Alternatively, put the address of the postmaster general on the front. Leave the return address blank! 5. Take it to a random post office, and mail it. Use the outside boxes, and make sure not to be caught on any cameras (you may need to do a bit of looking around first) 6. Repeat as needed, paying attention to the previous step and not using the same post office each time. This is probably not completely legal - but if you do mail it to the postmaster general instead of using a pre-paid envelope, I think you can do so without needing to pay for a stamp or anything (can't recall). It might be very satisfying to do it once or twice, though. /ymmv, the above is for entertainment purposes only
- hh2222 10y agoCanadian here, please use USPS when sending us stuff because they don't charge a $40 made up customs handling fee at the door like Fedex and UPS do.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- jeromegv 10y agoUSPS transfers to Canada Post, so in fact it is Canada Post that is choosing not to charge you terrible fees like the other ones. But yes, always use USPS to ship to Canada.
- halostatue 10y agoI have stopped ordering a physical product from the U.S. more than once when presented with UPS as the shipping handler.
- mynameisvlad 10y agoIf you open a UPS or FedEx account, you can usually bill the charge to it which removes a big part of the handling fee, so you only pay the duties+taxes and possibly a small surcharge (nowhere near 40, I think it was, max, 5 when I used to use it).
- colept 10y agoWhat I like about this, despite the privacy implications, is that it lets you preview upcoming mail. Less keys for me to carry every day.
- ghaff 10y agoAs others have said, this imagery is already created and stored. That said, people with PO Boxes who don't necessarily check them daily would probably be a good use case for this.
- chrisper 10y agoI signed up for this to try it out. Hopefully, I am not giving up too much privacy (if I have given up any privacy at all).
- Splendor 10y agoYou are not. The USPS already images all mail for all persons[0]. Not to mention their use of license plate scanners[1] if you're picking up your mail at a post office. [0]: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/04/us/monitoring-of-snail-mail.html http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/04/us/monitoring-of-snail-mai... [1]: http://kdvr.com/2015/03/11/mysterious-spy-cameras-collecting-data-at-post-offices/ http://kdvr.com/2015/03/11/mysterious-spy-cameras-collecting...
- pfranz 10y agoI haven't tried it, but it sounds like the only option is sending it over unencrypted email which would add a few vectors if you're concerned about privacy.
- Holmes 10y agoWas asked to participate in an early test for this last year. It was terrible. I have a PO box and as that address includes the post office address you would receive notification and pictures of ALL mail going to that address, so everyone's PO box. Not good.
- AdamN 10y agoThat sounds amazing! You can get a PO Box at a USPS location and then creep on everybody else's PO Box mail???
- Holmes 10y agoThey shut down the test after I pointed this out to them, but had I not they were completely unconcerned. At the time it was called "Real Mail Notification", so hopefully they have fixed the issue with this new iteration.
- zerocrates 10y agoThey don't seem to have fixed it. From their FAQ: Is Informed Delivery® available to PO Box® customers? USPS® is looking to expand the service to PO Box customers in the future. PO Box customers in certain Post Offices nationwide can use our existing Real Mail Notification® service to receive a text-only message without images, via email or SMS message. Check with your local Post Office for more details.
- Holmes 10y agoGood to know. Thanks.
- jsprogrammer 10y agoI asked to image a letter after it had been marked by the PO. The clerk threatened to call the inspector if I used any camera inside the building.
- zippergz 10y ago
- lowbloodsugar 10y agoFeature request: [a] accept [b] trash.
- softbuilder 10y agoWith [c] a spam filter
- iak8god 10y agoJunk mail is a source of revenue for the USPS
- bogomipz 10y agoI believe it is their biggest source of revenue. see: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/20/business/seeking-revenue-postal-service-plans-to-deliver-more-junk-mail.html http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/20/business/seeking-revenue-p... The US tax payers effectively subsidize an agency that delivers junk mail and there's nothing you can do to opt out of that junk mail if they buy those services from the USPS. Oh and the USPS still loses money doing it. I wish I could borrow from the Fed at 1.2%. http://fortune.com/2015/03/27/us-postal-service/ http://fortune.com/2015/03/27/us-postal-service/
- Veratyr 10y agoI'm not sure how well this works elsewhere but I did an experiment and simply refused to take the marketing junk USPS put in my mailbox, until it overflowed. They ended up actually not giving me any more, it's great.
- bradstewart 10y agoI tried that too. They just stopped delivering all of my mail.
- AtheistOfFail 10y agoThat's not the proper way. If it comes with an envelope, find a brick and attach the return envelope to it with duct tape (paid by weight), if it doesn't stuff it into another company's envelope (along with the brick)
- gist 10y agoWould imagine there are people that will use this to spy on a spouse or a significant other who gets mail at the same address but is able to get it out of the mailbox before the paranoid party gets home.
- losteverything 10y agoThere is today. Its called intercept the letter carrier. We know what's up. Hiding the bill or the package. Once had a lady tell me she wanted to surprise her husband by paying the mortgage when i delivered a certified from her bank. (She drove her van to find me each day) when I gave her the cert AND the (usual) non-certified piece she said she was paying in 1/2 in each letter. I knew it was BS and the letter was "bad"
- 1024core 10y agoThe USPS already scans all of its mail (link somewhere else). They have to do it to sort it: their machines automatically read the address and sort it. Any address that can't be machine-read (which is, like, 5%?) is sent via teh internet to some people sitting in a "cheap labor" place like WV where it is keyed in by a person. Later, the typed results go back to the origin and a barcode is slapped on the letter. How do they find the right letter, you ask? Look for the florescent barcode at the back: that uniquely identifies the letter. So unreadable mail is scanned twice to get barcoded. After it's barcoded, the only human who looks at it is your delivery person.
- losteverything 10y ago<like WV It used to be in Barbados
- sbuttgereit 10y agoAnd once they had one in Utah (I know because in the early 90's I was one of those cheap labor workers doing the data entry ;-) )
- Animats 10y agoThe machine reading is now so good that there's only one center left, in Salt Lake City, where humans look at images of illegible addresses.[1] "We get the worst of the worst. It used to be that we’d get letters that were somewhat legible but the machines weren’t good enough to read them. Now we get letters and packages with the most awful handwriting you can imagine. Still, it’s our job to make sure it gets to where it’s supposed to go." [1] http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/04/us/where-mail-with-illegible-addresses-goes-to-be-read.html http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/04/us/where-mail-with-illegib...
- arca_vorago 10y agoIt's not just for this purpose, there are more image scanners designed to be part of a mail surveillance network, but I haven't heard much about that since the pre-snowden echelon days.
- losteverything 10y agoShortly after attending a ios 4 app class I wrote a letter suggesting a table view listing all machine mail. Then sell ad space above/below rows. So if BB&B has their $5 coupon in the mailstream Pottery Barn or Crate and Barrel could but a hyperlink to their ad. The USPS culture is anything but profit centric. Without violating the sanctity of the mails there could be creative ways to leverage the combined household and individual knowledge for profit. But then when I thought there was no hope the USPS got the Amazon deal. Threshold mail delivery is another concept that could be interrupted by a user request (based on mail information in the stream) But it's not a profit organization and ideas are just fun to think about.
- DonHopkins 10y agoIf only I could drag and drop images of junk mail into a trash can icon to prevent them from being delivered, I could finally clean out my butterfly fuck swing. http://www.theonion.com/article/butterfly-fuck-swing-filled-with-junk-mail-2243 http://www.theonion.com/article/butterfly-fuck-swing-filled-...
- accountface 10y agoCan we just get a solid "do not call" list for mail. Like 90% of my physical mail is junk and it's bullshit. I'm kind of on the edge of wanting to be rid of all letter delivery in its entirety.
- ISL 10y agoJunk mail subsidizes the postal service.
- k_sh 10y agoI have a sneaking suspicion[1] that this won't be happening anytime soon. [1] http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/20/business/seeking-revenue-postal-service-plans-to-deliver-more-junk-mail.html http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/20/business/seeking-revenue-p...
- JBReefer 10y agoA very cynical and cruel interpretation of the modern post office is that its real business model is to subsidize political mailers during campaign season (which are phenomenally cheap) with junk mail, while conveniently providing jobs. Politicians, who are the benefactors of the low priced mailers, and who have an interest in preserving the few no college required jobs left, thus are incentivized to support the USPS at all cost, so they do. It's not the only interpretation of the modern USPS, but it's hard not to grumble about that one when using the incredibly poorly run locations that bless NYC. It's also hard to love the USPS when you consider that this interpretation results in thousands of tons of paper printed, moved, delivered, and then put directly in landfills every year for essentially no benefit.
- zwerdlds 10y agohere you go: https://about.usps.com/forms/ps1500.pdf https://about.usps.com/forms/ps1500.pdf
- losteverything 10y agohttps://thedma.org/accountability/dma-choice/ https://thedma.org/accountability/dma-choice/
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- losteverything 10y agoThis is the first time, I believe,where someone can know what is in the mailbox without opening the mailbox. (Which is a federal crime if it is not the owner/addressee) Separated spouses and private investigators will use this from the comfort of their home. (Of course one party will give permission)
- jrockway 10y agoI've been using this for over a year. I am still surprised how often I am tempted to click "report spam". I have no problem with the email, but it's amazing how many days in a row I only receive junk mail. (And this isn't the local spam that the USPS gets paid to deliver, someone really made an envelope with my name and address on it, stuck their junk in, and put a stamp on it.)
- toephu2 10y agoSo you get a preview of the mail electronically... but you still have to physically sort through it and throw away the junk mail?
- nikolay 10y agoIt's great - a very important tool I rely on daily now!
- bogomipz 10y ago>"Participate in this new USPS® service enhancement test and get images of the mail that will be placed in your mailbox each day" What is that "enhancing" exactly? An enhancement would be the option to not have something delivered to my mailbox at all because it is not important or is junk mail. Such an enhancement was provided by a startup called Outbox that the Post Master General put out of business because it was in conflict with the US Post Offices biggest "customer" the direct marketing industry. Outbox did many other things too like deposit checks for you and shred mail if you elected to do so. see: https://www.forbes.com/sites/theopriestley/2015/12/08/usps-launches-exactly-the-same-digital-service-it-killed-in-startup-outbox/#a08fb4d46223 https://www.forbes.com/sites/theopriestley/2015/12/08/usps-l... After September 11th the Post Office began scanning all American's mail. So it sounds like someone got the bright idea to repurpose that invasion of privacy as an "enhancement."
- oh_sigh 10y agoI had this in the UWS of NYC last year, and it is worthless. It's just another reminder of how much spam mail you get.
- totesanonymous 10y agoI work very closely on this product. If you have any questions, feel free to ask, and I'll answer as best as I can.
- reustle 10y agoAny timeline on po box support?
- totesanonymous 10y agoNone, as far as I know.
- superamit 10y agoAny plans to offer the capability to scan and see the inside?
- totesanonymous 10y agoNot as far as I know.
- Holmes 10y agoWas it a known issue that you were sending scans of everyone's mail to everyone else who had a PO box at same address?
- acuozzo 10y agoAre there any policies in place that would prevent your team from implementing a feature that enables users to tell [some postal worker in the delivery chain] to recycle particular pieces of mail instead of delivering them?
- losteverything 10y agoWill FSS be added later?
- Animats 10y agoNext, Recycle Direct™. Select the mail you want delivered, and the USPS sends everything else directly to the recycling center.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- atourgates 10y agoThat'd be awesome, but I expect there'd be significant pushback from the direct mail advertising industry that makes up a good chunk of the postal service's revenue.
- tcdent 10y agoNot the direct mail industry itself, but the postal service which earns a significant amount of it's revenue from them. Your mail carrier happily delivers any and all unwanted mail in the interest of their continued employment.
- burntwater 10y agoHonestly, I don't mind junk mail that much. - It's slightly depressing to come home to no new mail (I know, that's just a weird mental thing for me). - More importantly, it helps keep the postal service afloat, something that I think is an important service. -- It keeps a sizable chunk of U.S. government workers employed. Employed is good. -- It acts as a proxy wellness check for elderly and rural citizens. -- It lets Grandma cheaply send me a card and $20 for my birthday. Email and Venmo just doesn't cut it.
- strictnein 10y ago> "- It's slightly depressing to come home to no new mail (I know, that's just a weird mental thing for me)." 100% agree. I still enjoy getting the mail every day after I get home from work. I even find the junk mail interesting, in a "Why in the world did they send this to me?" type of way.
- tuzakey 10y agoI just tried to turn it on for my USPS PO Box, it doesn't work. They require you to verify your identity via an online option that just reports that it didn't work or in-person verification. To verify in person you need a us government issued ID (passport, military, but not state gov) and if the address there doesn't match you need a secondary document (mortgage, bill, etc.) The only things I receive at my PO are amateur radio documents and domain registration scams. There are less stringent identification requirements to buy a handgun in California (State ID + supporting document) That said, I'd really like it to work because it would save me trips down to the post-office only to collect junk mail and the previous PO box tenants non-forwarded correspondence.
- luhn 10y agoI'm trying to imagine a situation in which this would be useful and I can't think of one. Perhaps my lack of imagination is because I haven't cared for years what letters come in the mail—It's all bills and spam.
- jlgaddis 10y agoAll of my mail is delivered to a PO Box at a post office downtown. I don't go into town often and sometimes make special trips just to check my mail. I don't expect to use this service but, at times, it would be nice to see what mail is waiting for me to pick up. If I knew there wasn't anything important there, I might just skip going and save myself a trip. Also, my next door neighbors are out-of-state travelling for about half of the year and I get their mail while they're gone. They let me know if they're expecting something important so that I can open it and tell them what it says or forward it to them or whatever while they're gone. With this service, they would know for sure when those items arrive.
- technick 10y agoI kind of suspected the USPS tracked standard postage mail for a long time but had my suspicions confirmed after watching the first season of the US tv show hunted. Investigators were able to review images of mail sent to potential friends of contestants.
- criddell 10y agoThere was a Seinfeld episode where Kramer tries to opt out of the mail system. I always wondered - can you do that? Is there a law saying that you have to receive mail?
- losteverything 10y agoNo law. Just don't have a mail receptacle.
- cagrimmett 10y agoI got automatically enrolled in this last week and have been getting scans of mail for 5 days now. It is a complete disaster. I got my own mail one day, but the other four have been mail for other units in my building. I sent one support ticket in that went to an unmonitored inbox, then another that got a vague reply saying that there is nothing I can do about it. What a mess.
- cagrimmett 10y agoI'd also like to add that the one day I did get scans of my own mail in my email inbox, it was mail that I had picked up the day before.
- WhitneyLand 10y agoWhy don't they offer a junk mail filtering service? I'm sure it could be trained to be highly accurate and let you whitelist as needed. They just have to make sure to charge enough to still profit after accounting for lost junk mail revenue.
- md_ 10y agoThat's neat, but it would be even cooler if they sent you the photos online. The fact that they are printing them out and sending them to you in the mail shows just how behind the USPS is when it comes to technology.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- beezle 10y agoA friend (really!) subscribed to this so that he could be sure that his wife wasn't tossing some of his mail. Trust but verify.