[4212] in Privacy_Forum
[ PRIVACY Forum ] U.S. Postal Service Logging All Mail for Law
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (PRIVACY Forum mailing list)
Wed Jul 3 11:46:23 2013
Date: Wed, 3 Jul 2013 08:31:40 -0700
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U.S. Postal Service Logging All Mail for Law Enforcement
http://j.mp/12dHMIY (New York Times)
"Mr. Pickering was targeted by a longtime surveillance system called
mail covers, but that is only a forerunner of a vastly more expansive
effort, the Mail Isolation Control and Tracking program, in which
Postal Service computers photograph the exterior of every piece of
paper mail that is processed in the United States - about 160 billion
pieces last year. It is not known how long the government saves the
images. Together, the two programs show that snail mail is subject to
the same kind of scrutiny that the National Security Agency has given
to telephone calls and e-mail. The mail covers program, used to
monitor Mr. Pickering, is more than a century old but is still
considered a powerful tool. At the request of law enforcement
officials, postal workers record information from the outside of
letters and parcels before they are delivered. (Actually opening the
mail requires a warrant.) The information is sent to whatever law
enforcement agency asked for it. Tens of thousands of pieces of mail
each year undergo this scrutiny."
- - -
This has come up before, recently. Surprise level: Zero. Government
still hoping to find terrorists using postcards to plan their attacks.
--Lauren--
Lauren Weinstein (lauren@vortex.com): http://www.vortex.com/lauren
Co-Founder: People For Internet Responsibility: http://www.pfir.org/pfir-info
Founder:
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- PRIVACY Forum: http://www.vortex.com/privacy-info
- Data Wisdom Explorers League: http://www.dwel.org
- Global Coalition for Transparent Internet Performance: http://www.gctip.org
Member: ACM Committee on Computers and Public Policy
Lauren's Blog: http://lauren.vortex.com
Google+: http://vortex.com/g+lauren / Twitter: http://vortex.com/t-lauren
Tel: +1 (818) 225-2800 / Skype: vortex.com
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