Fun with the United States Postal Inspection Service

Miscellaneous
1

That’s the exchange of mail. Nothing private I guess, so I post it here with blanked out names. I think the USPIS is happy when ppl are informed, so they don’t have to do additional work regarding this matter:

Sent: Friday, September 14, 2012 12:05 AM

To: *** - Chicago, IL - Contractor

Subject: Re: US post office parcel#: EC***US

Am 14.09.2012 02:43, schrieb *** - Chicago, IL - Contractor:

Hello Mr. Schneider, I am emailing you regarding the above parcel package which is being sent to you from sender:

**** *

. I need further verification from you in order to clear this parcel to be sent to your destination because of your name being a common name match. If you can provide me with a middle name or mother’s maiden name so that I can finish the processing of your parcel within the next 72 hours. Sincerely, M**** Export Control US Postal Service

Hello Mrs. ****,

thanks for your email. Funny, that I get mail from USPS, aren’t the parcels normally processed in an automated fashion? I never received mail regarding my name being a common match. Anyway, my middle name is Christian, if you need that. If you forward the parcel to: ****** GERMANY it will safely arrive it’s destination.

Thanks for taking good care of the forwarding process!

Sincerely,

M*

Hello Mr. Schneider,

Thank you for sending me the inforation requested. I have passed your parcel and it will be arriving to your destination within a couple of days. As for your question below about why I needed the additional information. The USPS follows the export laws and changes to these laws which Homeland Security, Customs and Federal Government impose on us to follow. You are correct when you stated that you have received mail from the US before and that you have never before had to give additional information, but as of August 1, 2012 things changed. The parcels still go through our sorters as before, but now the sorters have been programmed with information that if a sender’s or recipient’s name matches a name on a common name list provided to us by the above agencies than the parcel will be pulled to the side and held for further inspection. The parcel than is processed and brought to my department which is Export Compliance and this is where we start the verification process of making sure that the name of the sender or recipient is not a complete match with the name of the list it was matched with. This is the reason why thousands of customers are contacted by my department every single day for additional information and be able to pass or return the parcel which are going outside of the US. These implementations are to protect the senders and recipients on both ends. In order to obey this further inspection, what you can do is when you have a parcel coming from the US, ask the sender to include your complete name as you have provided to me and ask for the sender to include their complete name, unless it is a company. I hope this brief explanation of our new process helps understand why the need for the additional information and also provides a solution to avoid delays in the future as far as your parcels go. If you have any other questions feel free to contact me via email.

Sincerely,

****

Export Control

US Postal Service

2

Hehe. Well, I’m safe there, as my name will NEVER EVER end up on a list of common names. My first and last name is both pretty uncommon. Most of them people with my last name is found in this area and are relatives of mine, or reltaives of my relatives - 3rd, 4th cousins and all that :P. My first name is also a relatively rare name, only 67 people have it (norwegian statistics agency website search). In addition I write my first name in an old way :P. And the combination of my first and last name is used by 3, 2, 1 or 0 persons (again. statistics agency search) My guess is that I’m the only one :stuck_out_tongue: - my grandpa also had that combo, but he died 10 years ago now.. :). Man the first time I ever heard my own name used (my grandpa was always just grandpa for everyone) and it was not meant for me - that was a pretty funny feeling! And it wasn’t before I was 18 years old :). Was in a wedding party with a guy who shared my name last saturday, and I knew him, but my wife and a lot of my friends didn’t hehe, that was funny, coz they always got startled when they heard the name being used around there, and it wasn’t meant for me - the same feeling I got the first time I met this name bro :P. almost eerie feeling.

Well, enough about my name… :D.

3

I mean whether you have a common name or not, why does it matter to the USPIS? There’s only one guy with my name residing at my address, and that’s me.

I should have asked…

4

Holy hell.

5

@nils: That’s what I thought, too.:shifty:

Probably a stimulus and/or surveillance program to keep people employed and/or monitored. :yawn:

6

:whistle: edit

7

Ouch! There’s only 7 people with my last name in Sweden :smiley: Plus a couple more world-wide.

As long as your name isn’t common with something on the terror list like that 4month baby who got denied to fly recently…

8

“Schneider… uh-oh, that sounds shady, lets pull this parcel and look for bombs” :wink:

That process must cost a hell lot of money, and I´d really love to know their reasoning why they pull parcels to “common names” and why people with these common names should have a higher likeliness of receiving “illegal export material”.

Many greets,

Peter

9

Haha, I didn’t dare to ask, because this binds even more time and will be put on the parcel shipping prices. Plus I don’t want to get on the home land security non-cooperative foreigner list. :poke: I heard, they mistreat people at the airport. Not cool.

10

You should definitely ask - with all Schneiders on that list, it is gonna be a fun time for airport security ;-).

Nah really, I sometimes wonder what stuff they smoke to implement such a “security measure” :wink:

11

:whistle: edit edit

12

@Hawkeye: Not too many guys with the sur & family name from my hometown. In fact only one. And I’m sure it has something to do with homeland security reasons. They want to monitor the parcels which leave the US. Besides I don’t want my file say under the “exports PCBs and chips from the US” entry “ask too many questions, probably a troublemaker”. You’ll sure get the full TSA treatment at the airport. :ermm:

13

kristal, didn’t you know that your real name is quite similar to one of the most wanted terrorists? They are looking for a really bad guy from Texas. Recently he hold up a stagecoach near Waldorf, killed all the passengers and stole a big bag with thousands of plastic knobs.

http://youtu.be/HZ1-Ta7BJFs

14

OMG, ROFL! If they had only watched that clip. He clearly sings: “Doc Snyder is written with an y!” :rofl:

But thanks for the information, will tell ALBS not to buy from this guy and to immediately inform the authorities, in case he shows up.

15

Nah really, I sometimes wonder what stuff they smoke to implement such a “security measure” :wink:

It’s probably the same stuff responsible for the questionnaire you are supposed to fill in when you arrive in their country…

16

Now I’m getting the full picture! Not that Schneider is a really suspicious name, they also want some of that stuff he sings about:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCeih1Nb9r0

I better avoid setting foot on US soil in the next months…

17

Hi guys,

I will do my best to reply without opinion or comment about “security” etc. Many other more suitable places on the net for talking politics and bureaucracy. :slight_smile:

The list they are feeding the sorting equipment (typically known as the “consolidated screening list”) is not the US no-fly list you hear about on the news.

The full consolidated screening list is freely available here: http://export.gov/ecr/eg_main_023148.asp as plain text or CSV.

A name match like this is actually quite rare (3 or 4 times over the last 9 years), and is usually handled without issue. Typically one of the agencies with a three letter name asks me for info about what I am shipping and what it is used for. This is the first time I know of them contacting a builder instead of me for more info.

As you can see from that list the dude they are looking for made it on the list three times with various addresses and variants of his name. 5 minutes on google shows he made similar lists in many countries including a UN list. (http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2008/sc9484.doc.htm)

Lots of countries share these lists (including Germany who put dude on the list).

Wow… Now I want more info.

Found: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_bomb_plot_in_Germany

Oof. Now I want less info - I’ll scrub this post for direct references and leave only these links so you can look for yourself.

Reason: I would rather this thread not show up in google searches for those nifty “security” watch words.

Short answer directly to kristal=:

Considering the list is shared by many countries, and this dude’s buddies are/were making direct threats against Germany demanding his release, adding your middle name to any shipping or banking will definitely reduce the odds of -automated- bureaucratic interest in you.

It definitely should have been investigated without contacting you (considering he is incarcerated), but bureaucracy and logic are often mutually exclusive.

To everyone else:

If you are contacted by any security agency about a parcel from me, your country or mine, let me know. No need to be intimidated. I operate in compliance with local/state/federal/international laws and I can answer any questions they have about use. I don’t collect any personal info aside from name and shipping address, so any answers besides what it is and how it is used are not mine to give.

Again without comment about governments and automated “security”, in these times shipments of electronics will sometimes get a second look from various agencies.

The cool thing is that when MIDIboxers are asked at the postal counter if a parcel is potentially hazardous, we can proudly answer “no, but the music it generates might be”. :smiley:

Best regards

Tim

18

kristal= now that you know the whole story, would you mind changing the title of the thread to something that provokes a little less fear/uncertainty/doubt?

The new guys might not realize I have been doing this for a decade without injury or incident.

Best regards

Tim

19

Just noticed your “status update” on this… It could also use a correction (as well as anywhere else you might have posted this).

Best regards

Tim

20

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