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USPS Service Kiosks Taking Pictures of Customers
NW writes "According to FOIA documents obtained by EPIC new Postal Service self-service postage machines take portrait-style photographs of customers and retain them for 30 days." IBM is the contractor behind the kiosks. Note that the kiosk is supposed to not complete the transaction if it determines the photograph has been compromised, so simply covering the camera is unlikely to work. As the cost of cameras and digital storage approaches zero, is it inevitable that every machine you interact with will take your photograph and store it?
How about wearing GWB rubber mask? or even Nixon for that matter.
Return of the ex-presidents.
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Now let's all overreact as if there aren't cameras watching you in almost every store these days.
A privacy issue my g/f will care about. She hates having her photo taken!
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Clearly this is simply because USPS wants to make their own version of hotornot
The stamps were printed with my portrait on them.
I'm unsure how I feel about this. On one hand, I value my privacy, and I dislike such intrusions.
On the other hand, I value the freedom of public places, and the freedom to take pictures of whatever you wish.
It boils down to an argument I had with a friend of mine a while back. We were in a public place, and a third party took a picture of him. He became furious, and demanded that the person take no more picture, nor distribute the one he had already taken. (The third party was not known to either of us; he wasn't just some stranger)
Now, I calmly explained to my friend that, since he was in a public place, he had no reasonable expectation of privacy, and that the other person could indeed take his picture whether he liked it or not. I cited prior cases and current laws regarding such things. (I'd recently done research for a class on just that topic.)
He became even more angry. "I don't care about his rights. He has a right to be an asshole, but that doesn't mean he should be! I don't want my picture taken!"
The guy took his picture again for good measure (nice shot of an angry face), and we all walked away chuckling.
To further muddy the waters, consider that digital photography, like p2p applications and globalization, is fast-growing and un-stoppable. There's no magical way to prevent someone from taking your picture. In the end, your picture can be taken whether you like it or not, and there's nothing you can do about it.
I don't believe that people have a right to privacy, but I do believe that people have a right to protect their privacy as best they can within the confines of reasonable law.
My friend, for example, could avoid public places and close his curtains, but he could not assault photographers.
Public places are just that: public. Whether you like it or not, people can see and record your actions.
Then again, this isn't just a person: it's a government entity. Should corporations/governments have the same rights as individual people? What if this were a private company, instead of the USPS? Would that make the issue any different?
What if it was just some guy standing near USPS boxes taking pictures of people?
It's a complicated issue with no simple answers.
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I am sick of people saying that any honest type of person wouldn't mind . Just because I'm an honest person doesn't mean I want pictures of every little thing I do kept by the government.
Say, you're an honest person, right? You wouldn't mind if the government kept logs of all your telephone conversations, would you? Or how about if they PUBLISHED the logs? I mean, you're honest and all, what do you have to hide? Say, since you're an honest person, would you mind if we put a bug on you and kept ALL your conversations?
This is not an example of a strawman fallacy, I'm simply showing how far this "you shouldn't mind it if you're not doing anything wrong" backward thinking can be taken.
I say that BECAUSE I'm an honest person, I don't want the government taking pictures of me when I send a package.
Even if you stand in line at a post office, there is a camera trained right on your face at the counter. This happens at practically every bank and government institute already. Nothing new here except a new tool for law enforcement.
Of course if you're into mail fraud or anthrax then this just might affect you, sorry.
I am supposed to tolerate something just because it's already been done? Thanks but no thanks. Just because we have been taught that we have no privacy in public doesn't mean we should have cameras trained on us at every turn.
Soon the cameras will be inside your house but it will be ok because they are everywhere else.
Well, soon enough it will get your name too, somehow.
As a bearded unix programmer who happens to be muslim, complete with a muslim name ( first name == first name of an at large chechen terrorist; last name == name of a 911 hijacker ) this kind of stuff makes my hackles stand up.
I happen to be white (not arab), and american born; but nonetheless I was raised with a love for this country and its freedoms by a father who also is bearded and muslim ( and happens to have the *most* common muslim name, Mohamad ).
I know many arabs who love this country and live here. We ( and by we I mean people with "funny" names, beards, etc ) are always put in the random search line in airports, given extra scrutiny at border crossings, etc. Etc. Etc. Etc.
Frankly, I don't really care about the camera in the USPS box. I live in DC, I can't walk a block without being seen by probably half a dozen cameras.
But this is yet another straw. People like me feel it earlier, but we're all losing our freedom here.
Perhaps it's time to take off; but where else is any better? I get the impression these days that the only place you can actually be *free* is in a 3rd world country that doesn't have its shit together well enough to properly monitor its citizens. But do you really want to live in such a place?
I guess the answer is "Anywhere in Europe". Sure you won't be any more free, but at least you'll have healthcare and good mass transit. In america we're getting the shaft six ways to sunday, and we don't even have a good society as an excuse.
Forgive my rambling, but this stuff grates on me.
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The cameras were originally included to solve one of the hardest technological problems with faithfully implementing a mechanical post office. It's necessary for the machine to recognize when the line of waiting customers has filled the entire lobby and is just starting to snake out the front door. That's the precise time that the machines need to pop up the cardboard "Closed" sign on all but one of their stations.
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