We’re adding barcodes to our regular stamps • Hacker News Board

Re: We’re adding barcodes to our regular stamps

#11

Post by danuker » Thu, Oct 06, 2022, 12:26 AM UTC

p1necone wrote: post #10

Symbiote wrote: post #2

At the top: > The barcodes will enable exciting new services by connecting physical stamps to the digital world through the Royal Mail app Then in the FAQ > Why are you adding barcodes to stamps? > > The move is part of the Company’s extensive and ongoing modernisation drive and will allow the unique barcodes to facilitate operational efficiencies, enable the introduction of added security features and pave the way f…

Is it to stop counterfeiting? It could literally just be so that stamps can be scanned automatically to check whether they are the right denomination, which squares up with "facilitate operational efficiencies". Is "added security features" really less clear than "prevent fraud"? The barcode would only be useful to prevent counterfeiting if each stamp had a unique barcode that could be invalidated once used, but the…

> to check whether they are the right denomination

This is a trivial problem compared to handwriting OCR going on in some post offices in the world, and does not require barcodes.

Re: We’re adding barcodes to our regular stamps

#12

Post by barbazoo » Thu, Oct 06, 2022, 12:29 AM UTC

Symbiote wrote: post #2

At the top: > The barcodes will enable exciting new services by connecting physical stamps to the digital world through the Royal Mail app Then in the FAQ > Why are you adding barcodes to stamps? > > The move is part of the Company’s extensive and ongoing modernisation drive and will allow the unique barcodes to facilitate operational efficiencies, enable the introduction of added security features and pave the way f…

If they're unique, and they better be, maybe that'll allow for tracking by default.

Re: We’re adding barcodes to our regular stamps

#13

Post by jcrawfordor » Thu, Oct 06, 2022, 12:32 AM UTC

Symbiote wrote: post #2

At the top: > The barcodes will enable exciting new services by connecting physical stamps to the digital world through the Royal Mail app Then in the FAQ > Why are you adding barcodes to stamps? > > The move is part of the Company’s extensive and ongoing modernisation drive and will allow the unique barcodes to facilitate operational efficiencies, enable the introduction of added security features and pave the way f…

My guess is that one of the biggest motivations is to enable one-time address digitization. I'm only really familiar with USPS but my understanding is that the Royal Mail Mailmark system is largely similar to the USPS IMB system.

Bulk mailers have long been required to barcode mail with destination information to reduce the need to OCR addresses, which is a particularly complex and expensive part of the operation. Non-bulk mail actually gets barcoded by an inline printer in the sorting machine after the first time it is OCRd, to avoid the need to OCR it again later in handling. Well, that's the case in the US. From what I can tell Royal Mail doesn't currently do this, and so they're going to have to OCR the address repeatedly on all non-bulk items. At this point, putting a unique barcode on the stamp and then associating it with the destination in an online database is probably much cheaper for them to roll out than adding barcode printing to their sorting equipment.

And it provides counterfeiting and fraud resistance, along with the ability to add detailed tracking to letters very cheaply.

Re: We’re adding barcodes to our regular stamps

#14

Post by throwaway892238 » Thu, Oct 06, 2022, 12:35 AM UTC

"Why are you adding barcodes to stamps?"

"The move is part of the Company’s extensive and ongoing modernisation drive and will allow the unique barcodes to facilitate operational efficiencies, enable the introduction of added security features and pave the way for innovative services for customers."

Answer my question without answering my question.

Re: We’re adding barcodes to our regular stamps

#15

Post by p1necone » Thu, Oct 06, 2022, 12:36 AM UTC

danuker wrote: post #11

p1necone wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it to stop counterfeiting? It could literally just be so that stamps can be scanned automatically to check whether they are the right denomination, which squares up with "facilitate operational efficiencies". Is "added security features" really less clear than "prevent fraud"? The barcode would only be useful to prevent counterfeiting if each stamp had a unique barcode that could be invalidated once used, but the…

> to check whether they are the right denomination This is a trivial problem compared to handwriting OCR going on in some post offices in the world, and does not require barcodes.

It is possible that the lower CPU time scanning barcodes vs scanning color images and detecting the stamp is a big enough optimization to be worth it at scale.

Re: We’re adding barcodes to our regular stamps

#16

Post by Syonyk » Thu, Oct 06, 2022, 1:00 AM UTC

Symbiote wrote: post #4

Symbiote wrote: post #2

At the top: > The barcodes will enable exciting new services by connecting physical stamps to the digital world through the Royal Mail app Then in the FAQ > Why are you adding barcodes to stamps? > > The move is part of the Company’s extensive and ongoing modernisation drive and will allow the unique barcodes to facilitate operational efficiencies, enable the introduction of added security features and pave the way f…

"Any person importing, distributing, selling or otherwise assisting in the sale of counterfeit stamps is committing offences of fraud and/or counterfeiting" [1] I am surprised there are so many listed on eBay. Just the two "sponsored" listings on eBay for the search "first class stamps" have already sold over £1000 of counterfeit stamps, and about £20 in fees for eBay. [1] https://personal.help.royalmail.com/app/answ…

> I am surprised there are so many listed on eBay.

I'm not. They make money from it, just like Amazon makes money from the counterfeiters, scammers, and fraudulent sellers. Google has plenty of ads for fake stamps if you search for stamps - they're about the only ones you'll find ads for.

Someone will write an article that gets traction talking about the vibrant market for fake stamps on eBay and Google, and they'll issue the Standard Tech Apology, "We are so, so sorry you caught us doing this and we will try harder to avoid you catching us doing it in the future," they'll clamp down for a few months, and then will quietly ignore the rise in the profitable listings again after the attention dies down.

People selling fake products are great ad buyers. They have to bid high enough to be placed ahead of "organic" results and legitimate stuff, and if they get caught, you can keep their money per the terms and agreements and such.

Re: We’re adding barcodes to our regular stamps

#17

Post by neilpanchal » Thu, Oct 06, 2022, 1:10 AM UTC

For those who are curious, these are 2DID Datamatrix codes, also used in the semiconductor industry extensively to mark wafers and chips. If you pick up an Intel CPU, its going to have a couple of tiny datamatrix codes:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_Matrix

Re: We’re adding barcodes to our regular stamps

#18

Post by jawns » Thu, Oct 06, 2022, 1:24 AM UTC

Symbiote wrote: post #2

At the top: > The barcodes will enable exciting new services by connecting physical stamps to the digital world through the Royal Mail app Then in the FAQ > Why are you adding barcodes to stamps? > > The move is part of the Company’s extensive and ongoing modernisation drive and will allow the unique barcodes to facilitate operational efficiencies, enable the introduction of added security features and pave the way f…

Above the FAQ:

> Our new barcoded stamps also enable you to watch and share exclusive Shaun the Sheep videos via the barcode itself, using the Royal Mail App.

Initially I thought operational efficiencies and fraud prevention were the likely reasons, but oh hey look there's a marketing angle too.

Re: We’re adding barcodes to our regular stamps

#19

Post by scrollaway » Thu, Oct 06, 2022, 1:29 AM UTC

MarchKilroy89 wrote: post #9

Translation: Keeping with our effort to turn this country into more of a Panopticon, and aligned with our belief that no two parties should be able to communicate privately, we hate that you can send mail mostly anonymously, and this gives us a bit more power to surveil you by making stamps unique.

If you're going to make this claim, at least give a reasonable explanation as to how this deanonymisation works. Otherwise your comment is no better than "they're putting microchips in the vaccines" junk.

Re: We’re adding barcodes to our regular stamps

#20

Post by MarchKilroy89 » Thu, Oct 06, 2022, 1:42 AM UTC

scrollaway wrote: post #19

MarchKilroy89 wrote: post #9

Translation: Keeping with our effort to turn this country into more of a Panopticon, and aligned with our belief that no two parties should be able to communicate privately, we hate that you can send mail mostly anonymously, and this gives us a bit more power to surveil you by making stamps unique.

If you're going to make this claim, at least give a reasonable explanation as to how this deanonymisation works. Otherwise your comment is no better than "they're putting microchips in the vaccines" junk.

A simple scenario that comes to mind is that given a letter, it's now easier to tie it back to the stamp's point of sale. "Who purchased this stamp?" is a very hard question to answer in their current (essentially fungible) form. Adding barcodes makes this much easier.

This assumes that stamps are scanned when sold, to tie their barcodes to the purchaser. That may happen. It may not. But clearly the more scans a stamp gets increases the tracking resolution for a given piece of mail both after AND before mailing. This "before mailing" part is new and opens the door for a much higher level of surveillance.