The Bush administration released a report last month on the U.S Postal Service, recommending that the agency “aggressively purse” the development of an intelligent mail system. The system would utilize barcodes or “smart stamps” to identify the sender, the destination and the class of mail.
CNET News.com reported “USPS already offers mail-tracking services to corporate customers. The report proposes a broad expansion of the concept to all mail for national security purposes. It also suggests USPS work with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to develop the system.”
“Intelligent mail has the potential to improve significantly the security of the nation’s mail stream, particularly if the postal service fully explores whether it is feasible to require every piece of mail to include sender identification, in order to better assure its traceability in the event of foul play,” the report said.
Privacy watchdogs worry, however, that requiring sender identification for all mail presents serious risks to civil liberties.
“We have a long history in this country of anonymous political speech,” said Ari Schwartz, associate director of the Center for Democracy and Technology. Any change that removes anonymity from the public mail system is “making a major change to political discourse in this country,” he said.
(via CNET News.com)
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