4 ms·
Could you explain this more? What does it do?
by pard68 8y ago
Could you explain this more? What does it do?
- danielvf 8y agoIt makes it more difficult to reseal in a non-noticeable way after someone has opened the the envelope and read it.
- IshKebab 8y agoAlthough in practice you could just put it in a new envelope... That actually seems like an advantage these letter "locks" have over envelopes - e.g. the butterfly one uses the middle of the letter to form the lock so it would be impossible to open it and then re-lock it.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- varjag 8y agoThen you'd need to fake the handwriting on the new envelope too. Which is certainly could be done by Soviet security apparatus: they could even write the whole letter, or even make you write the letter they want really. But it's a lot more bureaucratically involved and requires totally different set of skills than what a minder at postal exchange has.
- BrandoElFollito 8y agoAnd have appropriate stamps from all over the world. People collect these so it may not go unnoticed.
- varjag 8y agoTamper marks. The traditional "lick to seal" envelope could be opened (as lore goes) over steam or on a hot plate. Visible pen strikes make it hard to re-seal it unnoticed by recipient. The only picture I found is this: https://coollib.com/i/39/408039/img_17.jpg https://coollib.com/i/39/408039/img_17.jpg an archive picture of a letter from out-of-favor Beria's henchman Abakumov to his boss. Dated 1952, so this practice must have been there for a while.