This is the thread where I say things and maybe other people say things too

[George]

Another thought on FedEx (and UPS, Amazon, etc.), and then I'll shut the heck up about this.

I work in an office building in a decent part of town, but some of the floors in our building started requiring a passcode on a keypad in the elevator to access them around the time the pandemic hit. I guess the idea is to keep random people from coming in and wandering around (or worse). We have three (and soon to be four*) retail businesses on the first floor, so I guess that makes sense. In the lobby, there are now lots of colorful papers taped to the wall near the elevator saying things like, "Deliveries for Smith Company in Suite 403, please call 555-1212" and so forth.

We have a regular FedEx guy who's always talkative and friendly who has been coming her for years (he wasn't the guy who asked for my ID this morning). He was telling me one day that those signs are nothing but trouble for him. Apparently his boss has told him not to call those numbers because he doesn't have the time to stand around waiting for people to answer calls from unknown numbers and then coming downstairs in the elevator to meet him. But, if he doesn't attempt to deliver, then they call FedEx and make a big stink about not receiving their shipments.

And that makes me wonder if FedEx makes him use his personal phone for those calls or the little "tricorders" they carry around are phones also. And if my office building is typical of others in 2022, does he spend half his day dialing his phone in office building lobbies? I don't envy folks who have to deliver packages for a living.

*the new business that's apparently opening soon is a karaoke lounge. Do people still go to those?

[Tom Servo]

Yeah, I'm pretty sure the scan at bars literally just pulls the date of birth and determines if it's legit. I'd assume the bar code is signed in some way, though I'm not sure how you'd check the signature without having to give out the private key. Encryption was always my weak point.

I can definitely see how that's a weird area. You didn't request the delivery, and it wasn't you that requested that it be Adult Verified, that was the sender. I guess since basically you wouldn't be any money-out-of-pocket if you refused, then the onus is on the sender to make sure the recipient is okay with that. Plenty of private businesses ask for personal details that you can find on a driver's license, pretty much any business can ask for whatever piece of information they want, and then it's up to you whether you think it's worth the product or service to offer that piece of information. I think part of the service they're selling is that "we'll verify the first initial + last name of the person we deliver to plus that they're of age", and the only one losing money if a shipment gets sent back is the sender.

Given the requirement, I think it'd make sense for your work to have a designated person sign and that they would have to agree to be willing to share that amount of information.

[Cam]

I went to a dance club/bar once in Irvine. The door man scanned our driver’s licenses with a “tricorder.” (Good one, G. ) A few months later, we received promo material from the bar in the mail.

[Tom Servo]

Oof - you're right, I should be more worried about a bar that isn't publicly traded/won't have auditors/doesn't have a clearly laid out privacy policy than FedEx.

A properly designed scanner for that would just verify age without even showing the birthdate to the guy scanning, and definitely wouldn't store anything in durable storage.

It does make me wonder if there are companies out there that advertise ID scanners to bars that they can get for free and, in exchange, they share all sorts of useful contact info with the vendor.

[FaultyMario]

"all sorts of useful contact info with the vendor"

[Tom Servo]

Heh, yeah, this is when you're being entered into a contract with the other company without them making it clear what they record. Man, I'm so used to working with people's info directly and being subject to audits that I don't think about that secondary interface. I wonder what the legality is there, as I doubt they ever made it clear to people being tracked that they were, in fact, being tracked. Like, "by entering this bar, you agree to submit 'x' info."

[FaultyMario]

Kids, expensive.

[SportWagon]

Late reply...
Im not good at holding those sorts of things in my head, I do need to scribble.
But Im good at mental geometry, its not a visual skill, I seem to have a great knack at geometry/spacial stuff. This includes navigating.
My sister has bad eye sight and sometimes will ask me to find something in the panty - Ill often reach in without looking and grab the item because I know physically where it is!

Late cheap spelling oops observation.... I'm sure you meant pantry.

[Crazed_Insanity]

I totally didn't see that. I guess in my subconscious, it makes perfect sense for a "Dick"nose to want to look for something in the panty?

[SportWagon]

It does make me wonder if there are companies out there that advertise ID scanners to bars that they can get for free and, in exchange, they share all sorts of useful contact info with the vendor.

Can "analytics" include in its meaning "sharing all sorts of useful contact info"?

A lookup of its meaning (filtered by, um, Google) suggests anonymization is not a requirement for analytics.