Re:We’re adding barcodes to our regular stamps
by blitzar on Thursday October 06, 2022 @03:50AM
(#33105632)
Then you need to connect the barcode reader of every post office, supermarket and dodgy corner store to the GCHQ mainframe and voila - no more crime.
Re:We’re adding barcodes to our regular stamps
by scrollaway on Thursday October 06, 2022 @07:54PM
(#33115728)
Instead of issuing every post office, supermarket and dodgy corner store a new barcode reader which can scan the stamps themselves in order to prove the point of the original person complaining of a panopticon?
I think you missed the part where I’m making the argument against this being even sort of practical as a surveillance tool.
Re:We’re adding barcodes to our regular stamps
by Double_a_92 on Thursday October 06, 2022 @03:55AM
(#33105667)
That doesn't make sense. What use would scanning the pack be, if the stamps themselves are not associated to the pack?
If anything all the stamps would have two ID in the barcode. One linked to the sales location (always the same) and one as a counter for the individual stamps. That would avoid having to scan every single one.
But if you think about it for more than ~10 seconds, you remember that stamps are sold in packs of 4-8 at least. They're also often sold in sheets of 50+. All this makes individual scans painful.
So you want to play the devil's advocate and make more assumptions; say, for example, "every stamp could trace back to its original pack, so only one of them needs to be scanned". But if that's the point of this panopticon move, then why put the barcode on the stamp, rather than … the pack itself?
Because you know what always gets scanned? The product's barcode. If I wanted to track people who buy stamps, I would create unique EAN13-compatible barcodes for every single pack sold, always start them with the same number space + some digits for actual different products, and voila, somewhat backwards-compatible, unique tracking on all those stamps without having to deploy a barcode on every single stamp, implement a swap-out scheme, etc.
Of course, maybe someone at GCHQ is reading my comment and thinking "fuck, why did we spend so much money on this scheme again?", but somehow I doubt it.