14 ms·

Postal Service almost never denies mail-surveillance requests

203 points by Libertatea 12y ago

msandford 12y ago
Why would they? They're a de-facto government entity. They have nothing to lose by honoring the requests and a lot to lose if they don't and "something bad happens" as a result. That's not to say that I approve of this behavior. Just that it shouldn't be surprising. There is no oversight. If mom and dad are gone, why not have some cookies?
- higherpurpose 12y ago
  That's what worries me about classifying ISPs under Title 2, also - not that the ISPs aren't completely in the backpocket of NSA already. But at least if the companies remain private, things could change more easily than if they were much more dependent on government regulation.
  - innguest 12y ago
    Yes, that is precisely the problem with Net Neutrality. We really don't want ISPs to be common carriers. Keep them private and competitive.
    - revscat 12y ago
      There are downsides to keeping them private that are apparent to most customers of Comcast/AT&T/Time Warner. Nor has there been any indication that the private nature of the telecoms has served to act as a buffer against federal intrusion. If anything, the monolithic and centralized nature of the ISPs has made it easier for the intelligence agencies to get what they want.
    - 01Michael10 12y ago
      What are you talking about? The reality is ISPs are not competitive in the US and are monopolies. That won't change overnight either so we need Net Neutrality (ISPs would still be private???) regulation even if temporary right now.
    - msandford 12y ago
      I would agree with you if there was real competition; if I had 5 or 10 or 15 choices in who I got broadband from at reasonable, consumer prices I'd be 100% against any kind of regulation. Personally I'd rather see the federal government overrule states which have made laws against municipal ownership of the last mile. And to start handing out small seed grants to get more places to install fiber everywhere and lease it to whatever company cares to re-sell it. For example I live in Houston where there utility company only owns the power distribution infrastructure. There are 100 (or so) companies that sell power at retail after buying it wholesale. http://www.powertochoose.org/ http://www.powertochoose.org/ I consider that to be excellent competition. Getting to choose between two power companies, however, I would not consider competition.
    - innguest 12y ago
      I'm hearing the following rebuttals: - Comcast/AT&T/Time Warner is not real/enough competition, more like a monopoly This problem could be solved with the antitrust laws already in place. Despite being a libertarian I'm not opposed to breaking up these private monopolies that government policies have made possible. - Being private hasn't protected them against federal intrusion Being private citizens has also not protected us against the NSA spying on us. That does not mean the solution is more government intrusion to offset the existing one. I oppose the federal government overruling state laws in any sense (so I'd rather the laws against municipal ownership of the last mile be abolished by market forces) as that obviously stifles competition between states.
      - paulmd 12y ago
        The government isn't responsible for utilities tending towards monopoly - it's a natural outcome of any market with small unit costs and high barriers to entry. For a self-proclaimed libertarian, you're ignoring a very basic tendency of market systems. Natural monopolies are Econ 100 level stuff, and utilities are the textbook example.
        innguest 12y ago
        > The government isn't responsible for utilities tending towards monopoly - it's a natural outcome of any market with small unit costs and high barriers to entry. Murray Rothbard once said: "In general, I urge everybody to look at a government measure [...] not in terms of a tragic failure to achieve the common good, public interest, or general welfare, but [rather] as a conscious agency for doing all sorts of monopolizing, cartelizing, and other restrictive things. In other words, the government is not that dumb!" If you read about how the FCC came to be and how they were politically set on displacing competitors, you will change your mind. Free markets can't generate monopolies because they can't use the threat of force by hooking up with the government. If you disagree, all you need to do is come forward with a single example of a monopoly that exists without any government backing (regulations, cronyism, etc). And if I were you I'd drop this cliche of "oh this is Econ 101". It doesn't help the conversation and is just a veiled attack. In this case though, since the government influences what gets taught in universities, even Econ 400 isn't enough to understand free markets, and most Econ graduates come out of university with little to no understanding of the Austrian school.
    - forgotpasswd3x 12y ago
      > Keep them private and competitive. Hah!
  - 01Michael10 12y ago
    What? The USPS is unique in it's relation to the US government and is not similar to a regular industry being regulated by the federal government. I much rather have the government regulating my ISP which (in theory) I have a say in then my local monopoly Internet service provider calling all the shots.
    - Alupis 12y ago
      > I much rather have the government regulating my ISP You probably don't really wish this... because it will ultimately be bad (think of your local power or gas company). What you really wish for is more competition on a level playing field, ie. 6-10 ISP's per city who compete with each other for your business.
      - 01Michael10 12y ago
        Yes, I would... Should I make a list of all the shit Time Warner has done and tried to do to me over the years? I don't have any issues that are comparable with my power/gas companies (which I have more choices with by the way). I have already addressed the competition thing in a couple of comments on this thread... It does not exist right now and it would take a while to be a reality so ending Net Neutrality right now just makes things worse.
        Alupis 12y ago
        These are symptoms of lack of competition. That's not a reason to make the government regulate these businesses like you seem to want. Instead we need to spur growth of competition. We can look at the cities Google Fiber has rolled out to. In every instance, competitor's pricing has decreased while bandwidth speed has increased. That is what we are fighting for -- we are not fighting for a government set bare-minimum level of service for government set price. That will get your DSL-like service -- just barely "good enough" and no innovation because there's no real competition. We need to somehow get to having 6-10 ISP's in every major city. This will drive quality of service up, and pricing down. I also think it's a conflict of interest to be a content provider while also an ISP (comcast, time-warner, etc). Either deliver bits, or create the bits -- not both.
  - wahsd 12y ago
    Being classified as a public utility does not necessarily mean it will become a government entity. As you identify, there is very little if any separation between American corporations and our government, which are quite clearly engaged in rather fascist heavy-petting. All we really need is competition, we don't even really need the ISPs to be classified as public utilities. What needs to happen, by whatever means necessary is for the delivery and content to be firewalled and enforcement of regulations that prevent the infrastructure from discriminating against content. Infrastructure (i.e., spectrum, wires, etc.) should not be able to discriminate between sources of content and should solely be competing against one another and be forced to break up once they reach a certain size and market share.
    - 01Michael10 12y ago
      Yes, we need competition but... Even if we changed our laws today (which would still require federal action and money) how long would it take to have 3 or 4 players in most markets? A decade? The Internet will already be useless by then if Net Neutrality is eliminated.
      - mseebach 12y ago
        One of the (few) thing Google Fiber looks at when deciding to enter a new market is access. There's no reason to believe that Google would take a decade to cover the US if they could get the access issues sorted. The more poignant question is, what will your neutral internet connection look like after a decade of full-blown monopoly? Title II is monopoly regulation, and there's no reason to believe the cost of Title II won't be formalised monopoly.
        01Michael10 12y ago
        Why wouldn't you think that? Google doesn't have unlimited money to build a nation wide network overnight and even so this would only give us two players. You need at least 3-4 players if not more to have real competition. Your second statement is just wrong...
- Alupis 12y ago
  USPS is not really a government entity anymore. They are a private company who's head (Postmaster General) is appointed by the Executive Branch. Otherwise they are separate.
  - MichaelApproved 12y ago
    Can they raise the price of stamps without congressional approval? Can they cancel Saturday delivery without congressional approval?
    - mathattack 12y ago
      I'm not sure of the legal footing, but I put them closer to public than Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac. The government has to approve their overages, and they have no private capital. (Or do they?)
      - ericcumbee 12y ago
        Government Sponsored Enterprise is the term you are looking for.
        mathattack 12y ago
        Yes - GSEs. But the GSEs have private capital. I don't think the post office does.
      - tacostakohashi 12y ago
        https://www.google.com/finance?q=OTCBB%3AFNMA https://www.google.com/finance?q=OTCBB%3AFNMA https://www.google.com/finance?q=OTCBB%3AFMCC https://www.google.com/finance?q=OTCBB%3AFMCC
  - ZanyProgrammer 12y ago
    I'd say they are de facto a government entity, or at least pretty darn close (legal niceties aside).
- logfromblammo 12y ago
  I read the requirements at CFR 233.3, and the requirements are laughably slim. All you need is to (1) be a cop and (2) give a plausible reason. The USPS is not required to validate your reason, or do anything other that verify that the regulatory requirements have been met. And there are no regulatory restrictions on what they can share, except one. They cannot include anything posted from any person to their known attorney. So you can actually have all the cookies, except the white chocolate and macadamia nut cookies, for up to 30 days at a time.
  - saalweachter 12y ago
    And there's the problem. Why the hell doesn't that require a warrant? Other than that, I really don't expect the Post Office to ever do anything but comply with lawful requests. What's the alternative? Do you want the Post Office conducting internal investigations of postal customers?
    - logfromblammo 12y ago
      Oh, they do that, too. The other half of the mail cover regulation specifies the requirement for when the postal inspectors want one for their own use.
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
free2rhyme214 12y ago
If the DMV did the same thing it shouldn't surprise anyone.
- ohio_driver 12y ago
  The BMV offices in Ohio have already been privatized. http://www.cleveland.com/open/index.ssf/2014/06/ohios_drivers_license_faciliti.html http://www.cleveland.com/open/index.ssf/2014/06/ohios_driver...
- rhino369 12y ago
  Why would you expect anything you tell the DMV to be private?
softdev12 12y ago
This doesn't surprise me at all. Especially if you have ever been to one of those large Postal Centers. There are cameras everywhere, with signs saying you are being recorded. The interesting thing is an article in today's WSJ, where the incoming Postmaster Megan Brennan claims to want to "act like private sector". If that's the case, they should be much more hostile to surveillance requests a la Twitter, Facebook. The article is here http://online.wsj.com/articles/new-postmasters-goal-act-like-the-private-sector-1416788696 http://online.wsj.com/articles/new-postmasters-goal-act-like...
BillFranklin 12y ago
Are there any lawyers on here that can comment on the legality of this? It sounds like this is against article four of the US constitution.
- rayiner 12y ago
  4th amendment says: "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated..." Generally, searches are considered "unreasonable" if someone has an expectation of privacy in that context. In general, this creates a divide between private and not-private. The inside of your home: private, and protected. Anything visible from other peoples' property? Not private, not protected. Mail tracking involves looking at the outside of your mail. It involves looking at information that is not only not private, but must necessarily be exposed in order for mail delivery to function. Hence its outside the 4th amendment. The government doesn't have to "search" your mail to be track it--they just have to get USPS to hand over information it has to necessarily collect incident to its business. For the opposing view, Google "mosaic theory." As with many debates, this one comes down to a conflict between people who think the Constitution means what it says, and those that believe in "living constitutions" where we should insert things into the Constitution that aren't there, "because change."
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
  - jbooth 12y ago
    My memory's fuzzy, but wasn't there a court case 50 years ago that explicitly decided "outside of envelope is public, no privacy, inside is private, reasonable expectation of privacy"?
  - tptacek 12y ago
    My understanding was that "reasonability" is more complicated than this, and that expectation of privacy is a factor, but an equally important one is the balancing of the government's interest (and the legitimacy of that interest). A search might still be unreasonable even if its subject has no reasonable expectation of privacy, right?
jasonjei 12y ago
Wouldn't a smart criminal rely on digital or paperless means to carry information or value (BitCoin)? Use electronic statements (and fake mailing address when requested), etc? I'm just trying to understand the point of mail surveillance when alternative means to collaborate in criminal enterprise exist.
- mikeash 12y ago
  Not defending (or attacking) this practice, but a lot of crime-fighting techniques are made to work against stupid criminals, of which there are many.
  - happyscrappy 12y ago
    80% of crime goes unsolved so it may be that the stupid ones are overrepresented.
- TheSoftwareGuy 12y ago
  From what I know, a lot af illegal drugs are sent through the USPS, since its a felony to open somebody else's mail. (At least that is the logic of many of the drug dealers I know). There is no digital way of transporting physical goods.
usefulcat 12y ago
Potential for abuse = power / accountability
chaostheory 12y ago
Going on a depressing tangent, this is also why I worry about municipalities running internet. Then again I highly doubt that either Comcast, Verizon, or Time Warner actually reject any requests from Unc Sam
- organsnyder 12y ago
  I wouldn't be too worried about that. There are already municipal employees that are some of the most staunch defenders of privacy (at least in my city): librarians.
  - chaostheory 12y ago
    Yes, but they probably won't be in charge of maintaining internet related services for people's homes.

203 points by Libertatea 12y ago

Why would they? They're a de-facto government entity. They have nothing to lose by honoring the requests and a lot to lose if they don't and "something bad happens" as a result. That's not to say that I approve of this behavior. Just that it shouldn't be surprising. There is no oversight. If mom and dad are gone, why not have some cookies?

higherpurpose 12y ago
That's what worries me about classifying ISPs under Title 2, also - not that the ISPs aren't completely in the backpocket of NSA already. But at least if the companies remain private, things could change more easily than if they were much more dependent on government regulation.
- innguest 12y ago
  Yes, that is precisely the problem with Net Neutrality. We really don't want ISPs to be common carriers. Keep them private and competitive.
  - revscat 12y ago
    There are downsides to keeping them private that are apparent to most customers of Comcast/AT&T/Time Warner. Nor has there been any indication that the private nature of the telecoms has served to act as a buffer against federal intrusion. If anything, the monolithic and centralized nature of the ISPs has made it easier for the intelligence agencies to get what they want.
  - 01Michael10 12y ago
    What are you talking about? The reality is ISPs are not competitive in the US and are monopolies. That won't change overnight either so we need Net Neutrality (ISPs would still be private???) regulation even if temporary right now.
  - msandford 12y ago
    I would agree with you if there was real competition; if I had 5 or 10 or 15 choices in who I got broadband from at reasonable, consumer prices I'd be 100% against any kind of regulation. Personally I'd rather see the federal government overrule states which have made laws against municipal ownership of the last mile. And to start handing out small seed grants to get more places to install fiber everywhere and lease it to whatever company cares to re-sell it. For example I live in Houston where there utility company only owns the power distribution infrastructure. There are 100 (or so) companies that sell power at retail after buying it wholesale. http://www.powertochoose.org/ http://www.powertochoose.org/ I consider that to be excellent competition. Getting to choose between two power companies, however, I would not consider competition.
  - innguest 12y ago
    I'm hearing the following rebuttals: - Comcast/AT&T/Time Warner is not real/enough competition, more like a monopoly This problem could be solved with the antitrust laws already in place. Despite being a libertarian I'm not opposed to breaking up these private monopolies that government policies have made possible. - Being private hasn't protected them against federal intrusion Being private citizens has also not protected us against the NSA spying on us. That does not mean the solution is more government intrusion to offset the existing one. I oppose the federal government overruling state laws in any sense (so I'd rather the laws against municipal ownership of the last mile be abolished by market forces) as that obviously stifles competition between states.
    - paulmd 12y ago
      The government isn't responsible for utilities tending towards monopoly - it's a natural outcome of any market with small unit costs and high barriers to entry. For a self-proclaimed libertarian, you're ignoring a very basic tendency of market systems. Natural monopolies are Econ 100 level stuff, and utilities are the textbook example.
      - innguest 12y ago
        > The government isn't responsible for utilities tending towards monopoly - it's a natural outcome of any market with small unit costs and high barriers to entry. Murray Rothbard once said: "In general, I urge everybody to look at a government measure [...] not in terms of a tragic failure to achieve the common good, public interest, or general welfare, but [rather] as a conscious agency for doing all sorts of monopolizing, cartelizing, and other restrictive things. In other words, the government is not that dumb!" If you read about how the FCC came to be and how they were politically set on displacing competitors, you will change your mind. Free markets can't generate monopolies because they can't use the threat of force by hooking up with the government. If you disagree, all you need to do is come forward with a single example of a monopoly that exists without any government backing (regulations, cronyism, etc). And if I were you I'd drop this cliche of "oh this is Econ 101". It doesn't help the conversation and is just a veiled attack. In this case though, since the government influences what gets taught in universities, even Econ 400 isn't enough to understand free markets, and most Econ graduates come out of university with little to no understanding of the Austrian school.
  - forgotpasswd3x 12y ago
    > Keep them private and competitive. Hah!
- 01Michael10 12y ago
  What? The USPS is unique in it's relation to the US government and is not similar to a regular industry being regulated by the federal government. I much rather have the government regulating my ISP which (in theory) I have a say in then my local monopoly Internet service provider calling all the shots.
  - Alupis 12y ago
    > I much rather have the government regulating my ISP You probably don't really wish this... because it will ultimately be bad (think of your local power or gas company). What you really wish for is more competition on a level playing field, ie. 6-10 ISP's per city who compete with each other for your business.
    - 01Michael10 12y ago
      Yes, I would... Should I make a list of all the shit Time Warner has done and tried to do to me over the years? I don't have any issues that are comparable with my power/gas companies (which I have more choices with by the way). I have already addressed the competition thing in a couple of comments on this thread... It does not exist right now and it would take a while to be a reality so ending Net Neutrality right now just makes things worse.
      - Alupis 12y ago
        These are symptoms of lack of competition. That's not a reason to make the government regulate these businesses like you seem to want. Instead we need to spur growth of competition. We can look at the cities Google Fiber has rolled out to. In every instance, competitor's pricing has decreased while bandwidth speed has increased. That is what we are fighting for -- we are not fighting for a government set bare-minimum level of service for government set price. That will get your DSL-like service -- just barely "good enough" and no innovation because there's no real competition. We need to somehow get to having 6-10 ISP's in every major city. This will drive quality of service up, and pricing down. I also think it's a conflict of interest to be a content provider while also an ISP (comcast, time-warner, etc). Either deliver bits, or create the bits -- not both.
- wahsd 12y ago
  Being classified as a public utility does not necessarily mean it will become a government entity. As you identify, there is very little if any separation between American corporations and our government, which are quite clearly engaged in rather fascist heavy-petting. All we really need is competition, we don't even really need the ISPs to be classified as public utilities. What needs to happen, by whatever means necessary is for the delivery and content to be firewalled and enforcement of regulations that prevent the infrastructure from discriminating against content. Infrastructure (i.e., spectrum, wires, etc.) should not be able to discriminate between sources of content and should solely be competing against one another and be forced to break up once they reach a certain size and market share.
  - 01Michael10 12y ago
    Yes, we need competition but... Even if we changed our laws today (which would still require federal action and money) how long would it take to have 3 or 4 players in most markets? A decade? The Internet will already be useless by then if Net Neutrality is eliminated.
    - mseebach 12y ago
      One of the (few) thing Google Fiber looks at when deciding to enter a new market is access. There's no reason to believe that Google would take a decade to cover the US if they could get the access issues sorted. The more poignant question is, what will your neutral internet connection look like after a decade of full-blown monopoly? Title II is monopoly regulation, and there's no reason to believe the cost of Title II won't be formalised monopoly.
      - 01Michael10 12y ago
        Why wouldn't you think that? Google doesn't have unlimited money to build a nation wide network overnight and even so this would only give us two players. You need at least 3-4 players if not more to have real competition. Your second statement is just wrong...
Alupis 12y ago
USPS is not really a government entity anymore. They are a private company who's head (Postmaster General) is appointed by the Executive Branch. Otherwise they are separate.
- MichaelApproved 12y ago
  Can they raise the price of stamps without congressional approval? Can they cancel Saturday delivery without congressional approval?
  - mathattack 12y ago
    I'm not sure of the legal footing, but I put them closer to public than Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac. The government has to approve their overages, and they have no private capital. (Or do they?)
    - ericcumbee 12y ago
      Government Sponsored Enterprise is the term you are looking for.
      - mathattack 12y ago
        Yes - GSEs. But the GSEs have private capital. I don't think the post office does.
    - tacostakohashi 12y ago
      https://www.google.com/finance?q=OTCBB%3AFNMA https://www.google.com/finance?q=OTCBB%3AFNMA https://www.google.com/finance?q=OTCBB%3AFMCC https://www.google.com/finance?q=OTCBB%3AFMCC
- ZanyProgrammer 12y ago
  I'd say they are de facto a government entity, or at least pretty darn close (legal niceties aside).
logfromblammo 12y ago
I read the requirements at CFR 233.3, and the requirements are laughably slim. All you need is to (1) be a cop and (2) give a plausible reason. The USPS is not required to validate your reason, or do anything other that verify that the regulatory requirements have been met. And there are no regulatory restrictions on what they can share, except one. They cannot include anything posted from any person to their known attorney. So you can actually have all the cookies, except the white chocolate and macadamia nut cookies, for up to 30 days at a time.
- saalweachter 12y ago
  And there's the problem. Why the hell doesn't that require a warrant? Other than that, I really don't expect the Post Office to ever do anything but comply with lawful requests. What's the alternative? Do you want the Post Office conducting internal investigations of postal customers?
  - logfromblammo 12y ago
    Oh, they do that, too. The other half of the mail cover regulation specifies the requirement for when the postal inspectors want one for their own use.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]

free2rhyme214 12y ago

If the DMV did the same thing it shouldn't surprise anyone.

ohio_driver 12y ago
The BMV offices in Ohio have already been privatized. http://www.cleveland.com/open/index.ssf/2014/06/ohios_drivers_license_faciliti.html http://www.cleveland.com/open/index.ssf/2014/06/ohios_driver...
rhino369 12y ago
Why would you expect anything you tell the DMV to be private?

softdev12 12y ago

This doesn't surprise me at all. Especially if you have ever been to one of those large Postal Centers. There are cameras everywhere, with signs saying you are being recorded. The interesting thing is an article in today's WSJ, where the incoming Postmaster Megan Brennan claims to want to "act like private sector". If that's the case, they should be much more hostile to surveillance requests a la Twitter, Facebook. The article is here http://online.wsj.com/articles/new-postmasters-goal-act-like-the-private-sector-1416788696 http://online.wsj.com/articles/new-postmasters-goal-act-like...

BillFranklin 12y ago

Are there any lawyers on here that can comment on the legality of this? It sounds like this is against article four of the US constitution.

rayiner 12y ago
4th amendment says: "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated..." Generally, searches are considered "unreasonable" if someone has an expectation of privacy in that context. In general, this creates a divide between private and not-private. The inside of your home: private, and protected. Anything visible from other peoples' property? Not private, not protected. Mail tracking involves looking at the outside of your mail. It involves looking at information that is not only not private, but must necessarily be exposed in order for mail delivery to function. Hence its outside the 4th amendment. The government doesn't have to "search" your mail to be track it--they just have to get USPS to hand over information it has to necessarily collect incident to its business. For the opposing view, Google "mosaic theory." As with many debates, this one comes down to a conflict between people who think the Constitution means what it says, and those that believe in "living constitutions" where we should insert things into the Constitution that aren't there, "because change."
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- jbooth 12y ago
  My memory's fuzzy, but wasn't there a court case 50 years ago that explicitly decided "outside of envelope is public, no privacy, inside is private, reasonable expectation of privacy"?
- tptacek 12y ago
  My understanding was that "reasonability" is more complicated than this, and that expectation of privacy is a factor, but an equally important one is the balancing of the government's interest (and the legitimacy of that interest). A search might still be unreasonable even if its subject has no reasonable expectation of privacy, right?

jasonjei 12y ago

Wouldn't a smart criminal rely on digital or paperless means to carry information or value (BitCoin)? Use electronic statements (and fake mailing address when requested), etc? I'm just trying to understand the point of mail surveillance when alternative means to collaborate in criminal enterprise exist.

mikeash 12y ago
Not defending (or attacking) this practice, but a lot of crime-fighting techniques are made to work against stupid criminals, of which there are many.
- happyscrappy 12y ago
  80% of crime goes unsolved so it may be that the stupid ones are overrepresented.
TheSoftwareGuy 12y ago
From what I know, a lot af illegal drugs are sent through the USPS, since its a felony to open somebody else's mail. (At least that is the logic of many of the drug dealers I know). There is no digital way of transporting physical goods.

usefulcat 12y ago

Potential for abuse = power / accountability

chaostheory 12y ago

Going on a depressing tangent, this is also why I worry about municipalities running internet. Then again I highly doubt that either Comcast, Verizon, or Time Warner actually reject any requests from Unc Sam

organsnyder 12y ago
I wouldn't be too worried about that. There are already municipal employees that are some of the most staunch defenders of privacy (at least in my city): librarians.
- chaostheory 12y ago
  Yes, but they probably won't be in charge of maintaining internet related services for people's homes.