🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <comp-privacy1.120.8@pica.army.mil> Dewey Coffman <ibmpa!vpdbox.austin.ibm.com!dewey@ibminet.awdpa.ibm.com> writes:
>	I'm a big fan of using my Zip+4 on my mail, does giving out this
>	"extra" +4 of zip code give out any more info about yourself
>	other than "where to send the mail"?

Of course it does.  First of all, remember that your ZIP code already tells
a lot about you -- there are marketing databases all over the country that
have set up criteria like "Dinks with Dough" or "Snowbird City" to describe
the people they presume are living in various ZIP codes.

Now, add to that the precision of ZIP+4.  At the very least, ZIP+4 codes
are unique to a single block.  In denser areas, they may be unique to a
single apartment building or set of floors (or even a section of mailboxes)
in a building.  If the marketing database folks have got their act together,
I'm sure this information will start to become useful to them.

The only bright spot on this stuff is that the Post Office reserves the
right to change the +4 portion of a ZIP+4 code.  As a matter of fact, anyone
who sends mail at the discounted rate with the ZIP+4 is supposed to check
the ZIP+4 codes every six months or so against the Post Office's master
database.  You can buy it on CD-ROM, 9-track tape, and even on floppies
or paper directories for selected areas.  I still get mail with all three
ZIP+4 codes that have been assigned to my apartment building over the
past few years.

As you may have guessed already, because of these databases, it doesn't
matter a whole lot whether you supply your ZIP+4 to someone who wants it--
they can always look it up themselves.  The databases software allows you
to supply a street address and city name or ZIP code and it spits out
the corrected street name (standardized spellings, etc) and the ZIP+4.

So the answer to your question is no, giving out the ZIP+4 doesn't give
out any more info about yourself that they couldn't get anyway.  And if
they are going to send you any bulk mailings, they will not only get your
ZIP+4 anyway, they'll probably chuck the one you give them if the Post
Office's databases have a different one.  Yes, the ZIP+4 will make targeting
much easier for bulk mailers, direct marketers, and especially political
groups that mail to specific gerrymandered election districts, which often
have no correspondence to ZIP code boundaries.

-- 
Ed Ravin            | I like to think (it has to be!) of a cybernetic ecology
eravin@panix.com    | where we are free of our labors and joined back to nature
philabs!trintex!elr | returned to our mammal brothers and sisters,
+1 914 993 4737     | and all watched over by machines of loving grace