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Maybe this sort of fraud becomes impossible if we had cryptographic ledger based delivery confirmation systems (keyed to sender, recipient, delivery address). E

Maybe this sort of fraud becomes impossible if we had cryptographic ledger based delivery confirmation systems (keyed to sender, recipient, delivery address). Edit: Because apparently technological solutions aren't to be discussed if they involve recent, trendy tech?

mi100hael 9y ago
lol blockchain. It'd only work if they wrote the APIs in Rust and the management UI was isomorphic React.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- qaq 9y ago
  no noSQL? it's not webscale
ceejayoz 9y ago
Ah, yes, the blockchain, notoriously impervious to fraud.
DaiPlusPlus 9y ago
It doesn't need that at all - just upgrade the USPS (and UPS and FedEx) "signed for" systems to also include a photograph of the recipient for high-value items, and the lat/long coordinates of the hand-off - that would immediately show when items were mis-delivered and as a bonus, get a photo for possible police investigations. Or better yet: make it possible for those "shipping status" pages to show the full recipient address (e.g. by entering your own address first, maybe with a texting service using your USPS-registered phone number?)
- gehwartzen 9y ago
  Sometimes if I get a high value package from an unverified source I ask for signature confirmation, wait for the first attempted delivery and pick it up at the PO. I then record myself asking for the package and opening it in front of the postal official. It's a pain and takes a bit longer but should something happen at least there is a bit of additional evidence. But it's really just a crude workaround for an inherently trust based system. All that is ever tracked is the package which either the sender or receiver can easily manipulate.
Blackthorn 9y ago
This whole blog post is about wanting someone to take notice and step aside from an automated process that had failed, and you are suggesting replacing it with an even further immutable automated process?
- eutropia 9y ago
  A fair point, I prefer well trained humans to inaccessible algorithms, but in this case the idea is that the automation includes certain guarantees of data accuracy. Besides it looks like there were some humans here behaving like automatons anyways, and poorly.
liveoneggs 9y ago
How does the payment type change anything?
- eutropia 9y ago
  What? Who said anything about buying with bitcoins? I mean recording the package tracking event history in a public ledger with the relevant actors signing events using their keys and hashes of 'trusted' info, and comparing that info with the info on the seller's account and buyer's account. Pay with PayPal like a normal person, just make the tracking events hold the shipper, buyer, seller, etc accountable to the information they provided.
djrogers 9y ago
That wouldn't make any difference here at all. The author already has proof, signed by the postmaster of his post office - that's a very very high bar legally speaking BTW, you'd have to get a judge to sign something to carry more weight - and Amazon is ignoring it. A blockchain based delivery confirmation system could be ignored just as easily as this...

mi100hael 9y ago

lol blockchain. It'd only work if they wrote the APIs in Rust and the management UI was isomorphic React.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
qaq 9y ago
no noSQL? it's not webscale

ceejayoz 9y ago

Ah, yes, the blockchain, notoriously impervious to fraud.

DaiPlusPlus 9y ago

It doesn't need that at all - just upgrade the USPS (and UPS and FedEx) "signed for" systems to also include a photograph of the recipient for high-value items, and the lat/long coordinates of the hand-off - that would immediately show when items were mis-delivered and as a bonus, get a photo for possible police investigations. Or better yet: make it possible for those "shipping status" pages to show the full recipient address (e.g. by entering your own address first, maybe with a texting service using your USPS-registered phone number?)

gehwartzen 9y ago
Sometimes if I get a high value package from an unverified source I ask for signature confirmation, wait for the first attempted delivery and pick it up at the PO. I then record myself asking for the package and opening it in front of the postal official. It's a pain and takes a bit longer but should something happen at least there is a bit of additional evidence. But it's really just a crude workaround for an inherently trust based system. All that is ever tracked is the package which either the sender or receiver can easily manipulate.

Blackthorn 9y ago

This whole blog post is about wanting someone to take notice and step aside from an automated process that had failed, and you are suggesting replacing it with an even further immutable automated process?

eutropia 9y ago
A fair point, I prefer well trained humans to inaccessible algorithms, but in this case the idea is that the automation includes certain guarantees of data accuracy. Besides it looks like there were some humans here behaving like automatons anyways, and poorly.

liveoneggs 9y ago

How does the payment type change anything?

eutropia 9y ago
What? Who said anything about buying with bitcoins? I mean recording the package tracking event history in a public ledger with the relevant actors signing events using their keys and hashes of 'trusted' info, and comparing that info with the info on the seller's account and buyer's account. Pay with PayPal like a normal person, just make the tracking events hold the shipper, buyer, seller, etc accountable to the information they provided.

djrogers 9y ago

That wouldn't make any difference here at all. The author already has proof, signed by the postmaster of his post office - that's a very very high bar legally speaking BTW, you'd have to get a judge to sign something to carry more weight - and Amazon is ignoring it. A blockchain based delivery confirmation system could be ignored just as easily as this...