Occasionally USPS sends me pictures of other people's mail • Hacker News Board

Re: Occasionally USPS sends me pictures of other people's mail

#151

Post by Spooky23 » Tue, Jul 22, 2025, 1:28 AM UTC

kshacker wrote: post #149

1a527dd5 wrote: post #10

I have a version of this; I have the email {{popular-asian-surname}}@gmail.com and I've seen _everything_. I've had many many bank statements from India. I've had someone in California order a brand new BMW and got the details for collection. I've had paypal invoices and statements (this is one funny because they refuse to action the delink). I used to reach out and tell them I didn't sign up for their service. But h…

I have a reasonably common name. I am in Bay Area, and have received mail meant for people in Fresno or Bakersfield, someone in Toronto, someone in Australia, and I think someone in a London suburb. There are drug test results, online orders, legal discussions, store receipts and hotel bookings. I even connected with 2-3 folks with my name - don't recall how I figured their other email. It was quite common for a whil…

I was an early Gmail adopter and have a common ethnic first initial last name. People mess up their email all of the time and I get insane stuff.

One lady, a general manager of a factory, sent a zip file with her VPN client, a list of backup MFA codes and a list of SCADA and IT systems for a large factory.

A police detective sent a video from a paratransit bus that was in an accident. I got a bitcoin years ago. One dude had a hobby of test driving luxury cars from almost every dealer in the Washington DC region. I have a $50 gift card for an Australian electronics store.

Re: Occasionally USPS sends me pictures of other people's mail

#152

Post by Spooky23 » Tue, Jul 22, 2025, 1:33 AM UTC

bigstrat2003 wrote: post #135

1a527dd5 wrote: post #10

I have a version of this; I have the email {{popular-asian-surname}}@gmail.com and I've seen _everything_. I've had many many bank statements from India. I've had someone in California order a brand new BMW and got the details for collection. I've had paypal invoices and statements (this is one funny because they refuse to action the delink). I used to reach out and tell them I didn't sign up for their service. But h…

I have one like that. I have the email first.last@gmail.com, and I have a very uncommon last name. Lo and behold, Google let some dude in Australia who happens to share my name sign up with firstlast@gmail.com. According to the docs the two should be equivalent, so they shouldn't have let him sign up, but they did... and now I get his email all the time. I have gotten job offers, bills from medical offices, even one…

I observed a similar issue and years ago a Googler reached out after I bitched about it on HN and looked into it.

They claimed that it was a typo and I believe them. Places don’t validate email and people make alot of typos.

Re: Occasionally USPS sends me pictures of other people's mail

#153

Post by rothos » Tue, Jul 22, 2025, 1:48 AM UTC

USPS is awful from a privacy perspective. USPS will email photos of your incoming mail to anyone who files a change-of-address form with your address as the new address. They don't require any sort of confirmation.

I know this because after I moved out of a place and started traveling for a while, I set up forwarding to my parents' address, and after clicking the "informed delivery" checkbox I immediately started getting photos of all my parents' mail.

Re: Occasionally USPS sends me pictures of other people's mail

#154

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Jul 22, 2025, 1:58 AM UTC

sejje wrote: post #146

mystraline wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can solve this. Contact your federal senators and/or federal house reps, and tell them that USPS is sending pictures of other peoples' mail. Or if you dont want to do that, then contact USPS Office of Inspector General. uspsoig.gov/ The IG's are absolutely terrifying if you're on the wrong side. And you're 100% in the right, and they're in the wrong.

Terrifying? What was your experience with an IG?

[deleted]

Re: Occasionally USPS sends me pictures of other people's mail

#155

Post by Spooky23 » Tue, Jul 22, 2025, 2:03 AM UTC

pwg wrote: post #30

duxup wrote: post #2

I wonder he he also receives that mail or was going to but someone caught it? My post office for a good year was horrendous about delivering me my neighbor's mail. I felt like a Jr. Mail Carrier in training ;) Last few years they've been SPOT on. I tried informed delivery but honestly it's more of a hassle for me as my wife says "this should have arrived today" and of course it doesn't so she thinks it's stolen and .…

> it's more of a hassle for me as my wife says "this should have arrived today" Same here (minus the "stolen" part). Wife overlooks the disclaimer on the page saying "delivery soon" and assumes that today's photos should be of today's deliveries. Continually pointing that fact out has not (yet) dissuaded her from this belief of "today's photos equal today's deliveries"

In her defense, it used to mean that everywhere. That picture means that the mail was sorted and placed for the carrier to deliver.

The gotcha is that the staff shortfalls and prioritization of Amazon and parcels means your route based mail may not be serviced correctly.

Re: Occasionally USPS sends me pictures of other people's mail

#156

Post by fivestones » Tue, Jul 22, 2025, 2:26 AM UTC

bigstrat2003 wrote: post #135

1a527dd5 wrote: post #10

I have a version of this; I have the email {{popular-asian-surname}}@gmail.com and I've seen _everything_. I've had many many bank statements from India. I've had someone in California order a brand new BMW and got the details for collection. I've had paypal invoices and statements (this is one funny because they refuse to action the delink). I used to reach out and tell them I didn't sign up for their service. But h…

I have one like that. I have the email first.last@gmail.com, and I have a very uncommon last name. Lo and behold, Google let some dude in Australia who happens to share my name sign up with firstlast@gmail.com. According to the docs the two should be equivalent, so they shouldn't have let him sign up, but they did... and now I get his email all the time. I have gotten job offers, bills from medical offices, even one…

Have you ever tried just logging in as firstlast@gmail.com? If it works, with the usual password you use for first.last@gmail.com, it makes me think he has firstlastt@gmail.com or something similar and people sending him emails input it wrong, which causes them to send it to you. Maybe he also inputs it wrong sometimes when he is signing up for stuff.

Re: Occasionally USPS sends me pictures of other people's mail

#157

Post by bxparks » Tue, Jul 22, 2025, 2:37 AM UTC

Uvix wrote: post #126

bxparks wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Haha. Do you have a similar character for Japanese? Some douche bag added my GitHub email address into some Japanese spam farm a few weeks ago. I am now flooded with Japanese spam. I don't read or speak a word of Japanese.

は or す would be my suggestions.

Wow, the first one 'は' seems really good. Out of 279 messages in my Spam folder, 216 messages matched that character, missing only 24 additional Japanese spam. (That means 240/279, or 86% of my spam is Japanese, god damn it).

The second one 'す' matched only 10 Japanese spam messages.

Re: Occasionally USPS sends me pictures of other people's mail

#158

Post by dlcarrier » Tue, Jul 22, 2025, 3:02 AM UTC

mystraline wrote: post #130

sroerick wrote: post #123

I posted this on the Substack, but At one point, I entered the wrong address when I was forwarding my mail. As a result, I got my mail sent to a strangers PO Box. As a side effect, I then began to receive Informed Delivery for this stranger to this very day. In addition, I once had the Post Office disable my address. It was like a 101B address and they didn’t consider it legitimate with the city. As a result, they we…

You can solve this. Contact your federal senators and/or federal house reps, and tell them that USPS is sending pictures of other peoples' mail. Or if you dont want to do that, then contact USPS Office of Inspector General. uspsoig.gov/ The IG's are absolutely terrifying if you're on the wrong side. And you're 100% in the right, and they're in the wrong.

It depends on which organization they're in. Plenty of them think of their job as legal PR, finding the loosest precedent they can to justify the organizations actions as accepted and legal.

I've never understood why departments are reporting to themselves and not an independent inspector.

Granted, politicians and the people they appoint will do anything to justify their actions, even across organizations, but it might open the door for political opponents to call each other out, on their bad actions.

Re: Occasionally USPS sends me pictures of other people's mail

#159

Post by BobbyTables2 » Tue, Jul 22, 2025, 3:09 AM UTC

bigstrat2003 wrote: post #135

1a527dd5 wrote: post #10

I have a version of this; I have the email {{popular-asian-surname}}@gmail.com and I've seen _everything_. I've had many many bank statements from India. I've had someone in California order a brand new BMW and got the details for collection. I've had paypal invoices and statements (this is one funny because they refuse to action the delink). I used to reach out and tell them I didn't sign up for their service. But h…

I have one like that. I have the email first.last@gmail.com, and I have a very uncommon last name. Lo and behold, Google let some dude in Australia who happens to share my name sign up with firstlast@gmail.com. According to the docs the two should be equivalent, so they shouldn't have let him sign up, but they did... and now I get his email all the time. I have gotten job offers, bills from medical offices, even one…

I have the same problem. There are about 5-7 active idiots using “firstlast@gmail.com” and I get them all.

Suspect their real email is something like “firstlast10” or “firstlest” (minor spelling variant). Not sure if they deliberately misspell their email or are just stupid.

For a while really thought amount was compromised.

Slowly I realized they are just idiots and assholes. They don’t always pay bills, buy $100 T-shirts, own crappy vehicles, and seem to conduct business with people who don’t verify email either.

Even once got into an argument with an idiot persistently claiming he owned “firstlast.com” (as I replied to a thread using such from my email server. I’ve owned the domain for 20+ years). He was a certifiable idiot, also by trade…

I also get a lot of “mcafee subscription” PayPal scam mails. Also have seen a lot of spam real subscription accounts created using the same email but with wildly different names. Suspect it is fraudsters testing credit cards.

The sheer number of big name companies that don’t validate emails surprises me…

Re: Occasionally USPS sends me pictures of other people's mail

#160

Post by dlcarrier » Tue, Jul 22, 2025, 3:12 AM UTC

1a527dd5 wrote: post #10

I have a version of this; I have the email {{popular-asian-surname}}@gmail.com and I've seen _everything_. I've had many many bank statements from India. I've had someone in California order a brand new BMW and got the details for collection. I've had paypal invoices and statements (this is one funny because they refuse to action the delink). I used to reach out and tell them I didn't sign up for their service. But h…

Mine is {{random-initial}}{{random-initial}}{{uncommon-French-Canadian-surname}}@gmail.com, and I still get lots of wrong peoples' email messages. I've emailed more than one company to let them know they just violated HIPAA, and that they should really send a verification email first.

Also, when Venmo was new, and they were playing extra fast and loose, they set me up with someone else's bank account, so I just closed the Venmo account and used PayPal instead, which was a different company at the time.