[ppml] Nasty business with 2003-3

[Owen DeLong]

You also fail to address that the 6 character Canadian Postal codes are
equivalent to ZIP+4 and are considered required for Canada.

Owen


--On Thursday, February 12, 2004 8:52 -0800 "william<at>elan.net" 
<william at elan.net> wrote:

>
> USPS codes can only narrow down the search to very small area if the last
> 4 digits are includes (i.e. ZIP+4 as you indicate), but last 4 digits are
> not considered to be required part of zip or postal code - it is optional
> and used and added primarily by postal carriers to help in mail routing,
> most people omit it when just casually writing the address and I would
> suspect ISPs and customers that care about privacy will omit this last 4
> digits.
>
> Just zip code itself (5 digits) is usually wide enough (size of small
> city) and is not a violation of prvicay - while at the other hand it
> comes very  useful in identifying statistical distribution of
> assignments, particulary by automated means (its a lot easier to automate
> system to obtain and use  database ofall zip codes then for all cities
> and villages, large and  small in the US).
>
> Now this does not mean I agree with the policy - I'm opposed to it as I
> do  not believe the kind of privacy requirements that are being asked are
> necessary and their ppresencecauses problems for those investigating
> incidents of abuse and allow for much more abuse directly from ISPs.
> However not passing policy just because of presence of zip code is just
> complete nonsence. If city name is there, the address might as well
> include zip and make statistic analysis easier.
>
> On Thu, 12 Feb 2004 Michael.Dillon at radianz.com wrote:
>
>> There is a policy proposal that, on the face of it, is about improving
>> the  privacy of residential customers. It allows an ISP to remove a
>> customer's  name and street address from a whois entry. But it says
>> nothing about zip  codes. And that is the root of the problem...
>>
>> Here are some references that show how a Zip+4 code or a Postal Code can
>> be used to narrow down the physical location of a person to a small
>> enough  area to make it easy to stalk someone or burn down their house
>> in the  middle of the night.
>>
>> USA
>> http://www.usps.com/zip4/zipfaq.htm
>> http://www.usps.com/history/history/his3_5.htm
>>
>> Canada
>> http://www.infinitegravity.ca/postalcodeformat.htm
>> http://www.canadapost.ca/personal/tools/pg/preparation/mpp6-02-e.asp
>>
>> Now the board of trustees did note this as an issue and referred the
>> policy proposal back to the AC. But the AC did not address the privacy
>> issue at all. They simply bounced it back to the BoT with a note that
>> they  had "discussed" the issue.
>>
>> This is a flawed policy proposal. It claims to improve residential
>> privacy  and yet it does not remove all the data which identifies the
>> residential  user.
>>
>> --Michael Dillon
>



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