[Noisebridge-discuss] Fwd: Private Address Forwarding proposal to USPS

[spinach williams]

On Thu, Oct 17, 2013 at 12:19 AM, Sai <noisebridge at saizai.com> wrote:

> On Wed, Oct 16, 2013 at 11:45 PM, Andy Isaacson <adi at hexapodia.org> wrote:
> > What's the rate limiting mechanism here?  (Maybe we don't need one, but
> > I suspect we do.)
>
> Unspecified.
>
> I'd like you to be able to have a unique PAF ID for every person
> shipping to you, or at least for every privacy-different category of
> mail you might receive. I also would like it to not be abused by
> spammers, scammers, etc.
>
> I don't know how to strike that balance properly.
>
> > strlen() is a dishonest comparison, and you should be ashamed of being
> > so dismissive.
>
> Fair. But it *is* short enough to be usable. Even if it's a little
> harder, I consider that a worthwhile tradeoff.
>
who else would? what sense does it make to trade a simplifying mechanic
(address, which is a list of: name, short number corresponding to placement
along a block, street name, city, state, zip which corresponds roughly to
neighborhood, country  -- not a single arbitrary element, lookup is simple)
for an arbitrary alphanumeric? how much benefit is there for this
abstraction?

>
> > What's the Clearly Legal overwhelmingly common use case?  If a
> > technology is theoretically usable for legal ends, but is mostly used by
> > shady characters, you lose the social messaging war.
>
> Abused spouses. Ordering your porn. People with stalkers. Anyone
> famous. Preventing data-mining by cross-association. WHOIS privacy
> that still delivers to you. Being able to publicly disclose your
> mailing address without disclosing your location to wackos.
>
> "Shady characters" are unlikely to want to register their legal IDs,
> which this does require.
>
first case, an arbitrary number wouldn't protect an abused spouse any more
than a mailing address would as, in either situation, an abuser is trying
to send themself to a place rather than some mail and the primary mechanic
for that is social engineering, which cannot be coded away. second case,
p,o. boxes exist. third case, same as the first. fourth case, similar to
one and three in that most datamining is still done on foot by canvassers
(r.i.p. murdered census workers). dunno what the hell the fifth is.
publicly disclosing is ridiculous no matter what and there is already a
defense against it in p.o. boxes and other proxy addresses, some of which
don't require a residential address to obtain and therefore are more secure
than an abstracted arbitrary alphanumeric tied to a lookup table. do shit
the way shady characters do it, they already figured out how not to be
found.

>
> > You can't file a "change of address" form on paper anymore (or at least,
> > they don't have any forms at the SF Post Offices I checked); instead,
> > there's a flier full of advertising that tells you to fill out the form
> > online.
>
> You *can* file a PO box application on paper. And last I checked, you
> could file change of address in paper too; it's part of a "so you're
> moving, what spammers do you want us to point to your new address"
> booklet, but so it goes. The USPS gets a lot of its business from bulk
> mailers. :-/
>
bulk mailers hit every house no matter what, they're not really tied to
residence. the only difference mail forwarding makes as regards junk mail
is it'll have "[your name] or current resident" instead of "[prior tenant's
name] or current resident" or "our neighbors at". anything targeted comes
from a list you've put yourself on, so direct mail campaigns similarly
won't be  affected because all that matters is that your identifier,
whatever it is, is tied to your interest -- meaning any mailing list you've
signed up for, any package you've ordered from a given company, any
catalogs you've had sent to you and so on.

and what happens if someone knows you, knows your address, has lived near
you, wishes to reconnect but doesn't have your unique arbitrary
alphanumeric identifier? a human interaction is lost for no reason.

the rules of the internet don't always apply to the practices of meatspace.
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