5 ms·

I'm curious, can the government use surveillance on paper mail at the large mail operators?

by jokoon 9y ago

zzo38computer 9y ago
Yes, but only the addressing as far as I know.
- dom0 9y ago
  The Stasi was able to read all mail of targets (and they had many) fifty years ago. Practically all mail crossing the border was read, which again was a lot. I'd assume addresses are scraped anyway, since they are digitized for routing already, and targeted mail being opened without leaving marks (an art existing for hundreds of years).
  - TheSpiceIsLife 9y ago
    I wouldn't be surprised if it's possible to read mail while still sealed in an envelope. Wouldn't a sufficiently bright light and OCR be sufficient to read the average single page folded in thirds?
    - jimnotgym 9y ago
      In 'Spycatcher' IIRC MI5 actually steamed letters open with a kettle, or rolled them out of the gap at the top of the flap with a split cane! They had no way (at that time) to deal with cellotape, however. I suspect the metadata is a pretty valuable resource in itself. Suggests that people wishing to protect their privacy would do well to shield the inside of their envelopes with junk text, tape them shut, post them from random locations and use mail forwarding services and a mailbox service
    - nickpsecurity 9y ago
      There was a spray that made them temporarily transparent a long time ago.
    - CamperBob2 9y ago
      I imagine a terahertz imager would make short work of text on paper in a sealed envelope. Or a high-resolution IR camera, taking advantage of the emissivity difference between the ink and paper.
  - zzo38computer 9y ago
    You could probably detect the message being opened if you wanted to. I think I have read somewhere about RFID to see if someone has opened a marketing mail, and I have also read about using eggs to seal the message to make it harder to open without destroying it entirely, as well as reusing the envelopes from junk mail to send your own messages. There is other stuff too possible such as trap messages I suppose. Also, the message may be hand written and is not necessarily typed, so hand written message would probably make OCR more difficult I should think.
boomboomsubban 9y ago
Yes, a picture is taken of every piece of mail sent, tracking the "metadata." Additionally, the Church committee found around 10,000 pieces of mail a year were opened and photographed by the FBI without postal service knowledge.
- zeep 9y ago
  USPS can email you those pictures before you receive the actual mail, with informed delivery: https://informeddelivery.usps.com/box/pages/intro/start.action https://informeddelivery.usps.com/box/pages/intro/start.acti...
- saghm 9y ago
  I'm interested; do you have a link to an article or something describing this? I'm curious about how the FBI could get access to the mail without the post office knowing.
  - boomboomsubban 9y ago
    Some of the details are in the "Family Jewels," finally made public in 2007. The CIA not the FBI, my mistake there, would either arrange the post to be moved to a separate room or sneak mail out in briefcases or pockets. https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/collection/family-jewels https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/collection/family-je...
    - saghm 9y ago
      Wow, I'm also very amazed at the description of the document: > [T]his document consists of almost 700 pages of responses from CIA employees to a 1973 directive from Director of Central Intelligence James Schlesinger asking them to report activities they thought might be inconsistent with the Agency's charter. I love the concept of just asking your employees to tell you everything they did that they're not supposed to, and they just write up a bunch of reports and send them back. Also, fun is the warning about the PDF size, which feels a bit quaint: > this file is 28MB, so please be patient while it downloads

I'm curious, can the government use surveillance on paper mail at the large mail operators?

by jokoon 9y ago

I'm curious, can the government use surveillance on paper mail at the large mail operators?

zzo38computer 9y ago

Yes, but only the addressing as far as I know.

dom0 9y ago
The Stasi was able to read all mail of targets (and they had many) fifty years ago. Practically all mail crossing the border was read, which again was a lot. I'd assume addresses are scraped anyway, since they are digitized for routing already, and targeted mail being opened without leaving marks (an art existing for hundreds of years).
- TheSpiceIsLife 9y ago
  I wouldn't be surprised if it's possible to read mail while still sealed in an envelope. Wouldn't a sufficiently bright light and OCR be sufficient to read the average single page folded in thirds?
  - jimnotgym 9y ago
    In 'Spycatcher' IIRC MI5 actually steamed letters open with a kettle, or rolled them out of the gap at the top of the flap with a split cane! They had no way (at that time) to deal with cellotape, however. I suspect the metadata is a pretty valuable resource in itself. Suggests that people wishing to protect their privacy would do well to shield the inside of their envelopes with junk text, tape them shut, post them from random locations and use mail forwarding services and a mailbox service
  - nickpsecurity 9y ago
    There was a spray that made them temporarily transparent a long time ago.
  - CamperBob2 9y ago
    I imagine a terahertz imager would make short work of text on paper in a sealed envelope. Or a high-resolution IR camera, taking advantage of the emissivity difference between the ink and paper.
- zzo38computer 9y ago
  You could probably detect the message being opened if you wanted to. I think I have read somewhere about RFID to see if someone has opened a marketing mail, and I have also read about using eggs to seal the message to make it harder to open without destroying it entirely, as well as reusing the envelopes from junk mail to send your own messages. There is other stuff too possible such as trap messages I suppose. Also, the message may be hand written and is not necessarily typed, so hand written message would probably make OCR more difficult I should think.

boomboomsubban 9y ago

Yes, a picture is taken of every piece of mail sent, tracking the "metadata." Additionally, the Church committee found around 10,000 pieces of mail a year were opened and photographed by the FBI without postal service knowledge.

zeep 9y ago
USPS can email you those pictures before you receive the actual mail, with informed delivery: https://informeddelivery.usps.com/box/pages/intro/start.action https://informeddelivery.usps.com/box/pages/intro/start.acti...
saghm 9y ago
I'm interested; do you have a link to an article or something describing this? I'm curious about how the FBI could get access to the mail without the post office knowing.
- boomboomsubban 9y ago
  Some of the details are in the "Family Jewels," finally made public in 2007. The CIA not the FBI, my mistake there, would either arrange the post to be moved to a separate room or sneak mail out in briefcases or pockets. https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/collection/family-jewels https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/collection/family-je...
  - saghm 9y ago
    Wow, I'm also very amazed at the description of the document: > [T]his document consists of almost 700 pages of responses from CIA employees to a 1973 directive from Director of Central Intelligence James Schlesinger asking them to report activities they thought might be inconsistent with the Agency's charter. I love the concept of just asking your employees to tell you everything they did that they're not supposed to, and they just write up a bunch of reports and send them back. Also, fun is the warning about the PDF size, which feels a bit quaint: > this file is 28MB, so please be patient while it downloads