Silk Road forums
Discussion => Shipping => Topic started by: fuckthepolice101 on July 14, 2012, 08:49 pm
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This is a very interesting read written by (in)famous Canadian hacker Cyb0rg/asm
Very informative for canadian shippers
http://www.hackcanada.com/canadian/scams/canphack.txt
___________________________________________________
| ..... |
| CYB0RG/ASM : : |
| 2oo5-11-o4 : : |
| :...: |
| |
| Canada Post: |
| A Phacker's Guide |
| V0O 0O2 |
| |
| |
| |
| || | ||| | || | |
|___________________________________________________|
Introduction (o)
Disclaimer (1)
Anatomy of a Delivery (2)
Faster Routing (3)
Mail for the Blind (4)
Stamp Recycling (5)
No Postage Necessary (6)
Oldest Scam in the Book (7)
Postage-Paid Abuse (8)
POSTpac / POSTroute / POSTcct (9)
Phonebook (1o)
Resources (11)
Revision History (12)
___ ______________
(( o ) (( Introduction )
PHACKING is the art of Postal Hacking; or manipulating the mail system in a
variety of high and low tech ways; sometimes legal, sometimes illegal;
sometimes to get free delivery and sometimes to get faster delivery.
Phacking has been around since the first stamps were invented in 1847 and were
shortly thereafter forged by hand. Since then, Phacking has progressed to a
very high-tech level thanks to an assiduous but predominantly unheard of band
of pioneers such as The Postmasters, PhedEx, Zip C0de, PoD, Dr. Sort, Post
Officer, C-Rate, X-Press, Maleman, NonFunc, and The Courier). Phacking has
certainly been kept fairly hush-hush. Indeed, most people have never even heard
of Phacking, and I have certainly never seen any Canadian Phacking information,
much less met or spoken to a Canadian Phacker. Heck, try to find ANY Phacking
information on the 'Net and you will likely come up empty-handed.
At any rate, having never worked in the postal industry and having never spoken
to a Phacker, I certainly do not have the knowledge of the postal systems
inner-workings that would allow me to present any truly advanced Phacking
techniques. The Phacks included are what I could come up with based on the
research I have done so far and are all quite primitive. Hopefully, those in
the know will contribute information for a future version of this file, and
I will continue to learn more when I have absolutely nothing better to do
with my time.
Honestly, I'm sure you're asking yourself "why bother? snail-mail is so
obsolete and snail-like". I hear ya', don't ask me why I do the things I do.
Hackers are just an intellectually migratory life form with a positive
tropism for computers. I guess it's the journey and not the destination or
something. So, uh, let's get postal.
___ ____________
(( 1 ) (( Disclaimer )
Phucking with the mail is generally a VERY SERIOUS CRIME. Keep this in mind --
sending a letter for free is easy, but habitually abusing the postal service
will land you in a heap of trouble. You're far better off playing with the
tricks to get your mail routed faster and leaving the free-mail scams to those
who enjoy prison. That being said, I accept absolutely no responsibility or
liability for your actions or for the applicability, legality, or use of the
information in this document. Fairly warned be thee, says I. Now phack-off.
___ _______________________
(( 2 ) (( Anatomy of a Delivery )
Canada Post Corporation (CPC) delivers approximately 8 billion pieces of mail
every year. There are numerous places for things to go horribly wrong,
resulting in slower delivery, or even failed delivery. The following diagram
shows the highlights of a letters adventure as near as I've been able to
determine it. I also detail each stage of the journey and point out potential
postal pitfalls, as well as opportunities for you to improve your letters
chances for successful and "speedy" delivery. Please note that this analysis
is not comprehensive and may even contain factual errors, but it is the best
I've been able to piece together thus far as a CPC outsider.
Letter -----(a)----> Mailbox -----(b)----> Delivery Facility -----(c)---.
:
:
:
:
:
,---- MLOCR <---(e)--- MARK <---(d)--- Distribution Centre Facility <---'
:
:
:
: .--(f1)--> BCS --.
: / \
: / \
'------<----(f2)---> LSM ----->-----(g)-----> Destination Facility -----.
\ / :
\ / :
`--(f3)--> FSM --' :
:
:
:
Addressee <----(i)---- Carrier <----(h)---'
a) Letter ---> Mailbox
This is you, taking your letter to the mailbox... DUH! Note the pick-up
days and times which are usually labeled on the mailbox. Not a lot of
things can go wrong at this stage and it would take a very special kind
of retard to screw up the mission at this juncture.
b) Mailbox ---> Delivery Facility
The letters in the mailbox are picked up on schedule and moved by a CPC
van to a CPC Delivery Facility.
c) Delivery Facility ---> Distribution Centre Facility
A Distribution Centre Facility (DCF) is a major postal facility where mail
is received, sorted, handled and sent to, or received from, a group of
dependent postal facilities.
d) Distribution Centre Facility ---> MARK
At the DCF is where your letter meets the MARK. The MARK facer-canceller
automatically cancels stamped letter-size mail and arranges letters so
that they all face the same direction. Using phosphorescent detectors,
the MARK determines if a letter is stamped by detecting minute traces of
phosphor in stamps. Unstamped mail is sorted into a separate bin for human
processing.
e) MARK ---> MLOCR
From the MARK, your letter travels to the Multi-Line Optical Character
Reader (MLOCR) machine. This machine reads the complete address on a
properly addressed mail item and encodes the corresponding fluorescent
bar code. If you don't want a human messing with your mail and slowing
things down it is critical that you address your mail in a clear and
proper manner so that the MLOCR can read the address correctly. If the
machine can't read it, then a human is given a fraction of a second to
decipher the Postal Code and key it in. One typo and your letter may end
up in Kugluktuk.
f1) MLOCR ---> BCS
The Bar Code Sorter (BCS) machine sorts high volume mail such as bar coded
Business Reply Mail (BRM).
f2) MLOCR ---> LSM
The Letter Sorting Machine (LSM) sorts mail by reading fluorescent bar
codes printed on letter-sized mail.
f3) MLOCR ---> FSM
Flats Sorting Machine (FSM) – A machine that sorts mail flats (larger than
letter-size items) by reading addresses and/or the bar codes printed on
such mail, and encodes mail with the bar code as required. Properly and
legibly formatting your destination address will ensure your letter gets
sorted quickly and correctly. Or better yet, barcode it yourself. More on
that later.
g) BCS / LSM / FSM ---> Destination Facility
After being sorted at the Distribution Centre Facility, your letter is
forwarded on to its destination Delivery Facility.
h) Destination Facility ---> Carrier
The Letter Carriers retrieve the mail for their route from this delivery
facility. This is the facility from which the mode of delivery emanates
(e.g. location of postal box, origination of the rural route or letter
carrier route) and can include urban postal stations, letter carrier
depots, and rural postal facilities.
i) Carrier ---> Addressee
Postman Dan carries the letter to the person's mailbox that you addressed
it to. Postman Dan might shoot his co-workers and get indicted before
even hitting the street or he might trade his mail for crack cocaine. =/
As you can see, it's a miracle any letters ever get delivered at all, what
with those humans in there always bungling things up. Read on to learn what
you can do to get some of those post-office philistines out of the loop.
___ ________________
(( 3 ) (( Faster Routing )
Let's face it; humans are slow, fat, lazy, and often not too bright. When you
want the job done right, machines are faster and sexier. It's just a fact.
This holds especially true in the world of Canada Post.
There are some simple (and legal!) things you can do to ensure your letter is
handled by as few humans as possible. The benefit here is not only faster (and
sexier) delivery, but also, if you are pulling some of the other tricks in
this document, it is often to your benefit to have as few postal-workers as
possible scrutinizin' and molestin' your "handi-work". So, just follow the
tips and the faster it'll ship...
Properly format your mailing addresses:
. Type (or print clearly) the address all in uppercase.
. Format address with a uniform left margin.
. Use proper Unit identifiers (APT = Apartment, SUITE = Suite, UNIT = Unit).
Unit number is placed before the civic number (official number assigned to
an address by the municipality) with a hyphen between, OR after the Street
Type, using an acceptable Unit identifier (ex. APT 69).
. Use proper Street Type identifiers (ST = Street, AVE = Avenue, BLVD =
Boulevard).
. Use proper Street Directions (E, N, NE, NW, S, SE, SW, W).
. Post Office Boxes are indicated in the form "PO BOX 111" and followed with
the Station or Retail Postal Outlet where appropriate (STN = Station, RPO =
Retail Postal Outlet).
. Rural Routes should be indicated in the form "RR 2" and followed with the
Station or Retail Postal Outlet where appropriate.
. City, Province, and Postal Code should all be on the same line with two
spaces between Province and Postal Code. Use the appropriate two character
Province Code (AB, BC, MB, NB, NF, NT, NS, NU, ON, PE, QC, SK, YT).
. Addresses must be less than 40 characters per line, including spaces.
. Postal codes should be printed in upper case with the first three
characters separated from the last three by one space (no hyphens).
. Do not use punctuation unless it is part of a proper name. Never use the #
symbol either.
. Use monospace (non-proportional) fonts such as Courier.
. All characters must be larger than 2 mm and smaller than 5 mm (10 to 12
point). Return addresses may use smaller characters and must not be larger
than the destination address.
. Space between address lines must be at least 0.5 mm but no more than one
blank line.
. Return Addresses are formatted in the same way as the destination address,
and located in the top-left corner of the envelope, clearly separated from
the destination address, or on the back of the envelope at the top.
If you're still confused, check out the "Canadian Addressing Guide" available
from Canada Post Corporation.
Ok, that was pretty basic stuff and it will certainly help the MLOCR (Multi-
Line Optical Character Reader) read your address, but to make it completely
foolproof you'll want to use...
- BAR CODES -
Bar codes are the miracle of modern science that, among other things, would
have the checkout lines at the grocery stores moving blazing fast if it
weren't for the ignorant masses holding things up while they piss around with
their fooking cash cards and wait to be authorized at 2400 baud by a system
overloaded with hose-monkeys eager to share their spending habits with Big
Brother and whoever else might want to buy their info for some nefarious
purpose. But I digress, Bar Codes in the postal world are a godsend. Bar Codes
have gotten the mail moving through the postal system faster than lead from a
disgruntled postal workers .44 caliber sidearm. Ok, maybe not that fast. How
about faster than a snail on methamphetamine? Awe jeah. That is fast.
Canada Post uses a barcode standard known as the "4-State Barcode". The 4-State
barcode is a height modulated barcode consisting of both alpha and numeric
character sets. This code may be applied by the customer, or by Canada Post's
automated sorting equipment. A properly designed and rendered barcode will
allow the FSM (Flats Sorting Machine) to sort the mail items based on the
4-State barcode thereby increasing the speed at which your letter will flow
through the system.
I was going to give a detailed guide to creating your own 4-state barcodes, but
it truly bores the hell out of me... maybe some other time. So for now I will
leave you to refer to the Canada Post 4-State Barcode Handbook (available from
Canada Post) for design information.
-
(part 2 as I was unable to fit it all in one post)
___ ____________________
(( 4 ) (( Mail for the Blind )
Canada Post offers free mail services for blind people and institutions
serving the blind. This service is available within Canada, to the U.S.A., and
to international destinations at no charge when sent by surface mail.
Mail for the blind is generally indicated on the envelope with a simple rubber
stamp. The printing or inkpad stamp should look like this in Canada:
______________________________________
| |
| LITERATURE FOR THE BLIND |
| |
| DOCUMENTATION À L'USAGE DES AVEUGLES |
|______________________________________|
In the United States, they tend to look like this:
___________________________
| |
| FREE MATTER FOR THE BLIND |
| AND PHYS. HANDICAPPED |
|___________________________|
A non-serif (i.e. Arial) style font is typically used, and the mark is placed
in the upper right hand corner of the envelope where the postage stamp would
normally be placed. Even a novice counterfeiter should have no problem
duplicating this mark with a basic graphics program and a printer.
According to Canada Post Corporation only these items may be mailed using this
free service:
. Books, periodicals, papers, and unsealed letters impressed in Braille or
similar raised type.
. Tapes and records sent by a blind person.
. Plates for printing literature for the blind.
. Tapes, records, and special writing paper intended solely for the use of
the blind when mailed by, or addressed to, a recognized institution for
the blind.
Of course only a callous asshole would abuse this service and risk ruining it
for those who truly need it.
___ _________________
(( 5 ) (( Stamp Recycling )
Reusing stamps not only makes good economic sense, but good environmental
sense as well. Save a tree, mail for free! Here are a few methods for reusing
those stamps which one can occasionally get away with:
A. Someone sent you a letter and the postmark didn't even hit the stamp.
Well, just cut that stamp out and tape or glue it on the letter you want
to send.
B. If the postmark damage to the stamp is not too severe, you can often use
an eraser to scrub off the postmark.
C. Tape over your stamp with "magic tape". You know, that transparent tape
that is easy to peel off. Do a good job of it so it's not too noticeable.
Your recipient will be able to peel that tape off and reuse the stamp.
"Hey, sometimes the dang stamp just won't stick by itself."
D. Canada Post is constantly raising the price of stamps by a penny or two
in an effort to screw the postage paying consumer. They then declare that
you must buy 2 cent stamps to use in conjunction with your old stamps that
don't quite meet the new postal rate. Often people end up buying new
stamps and the old stamps go to waste. Or, they end up doubling up the
old stamps they have and grossly exceeding the minimum required postage
just to ensure the letter gets delivered. Well, I say phuck that and
phuck Canada Post. Use your old stamps as you normally would. Canada Post
does not waste their time and money returning a letter that is just a few
cents short on postage.
___ ______________________
(( 6 ) (( No Postage Necessary )
Wouldn't it be nice to just mail stuff without worrying about postage at all?
Well, some people have that privilege. The "Franking Privilege" is a statutory
privilege available to the Governor General (http://www.gg.ca/), the secretary
to the Governor General, Speaker or Clerk of the Senate or the House of Commons,
the Parliamentary Librarian or Associate, members of the Senate and of the
House of Commons, and certain privileged others. Franking privilege allows for
the marking on an item of mail with an official signature, initials, or sign
(franking) indicating the right of the sender to free mailing privileges. If
you knew what a "frank" looked like you could probably send mail for free this
way. I'd never seen a piece of "franked" mail so I decided to write a letter
to the Governor General (currently Adrienne Clarkson) with some suitable social
engineering and see if I could get her to write back using her franking
privileges. As an added bonus there is no postage necessary when writing to
the Governor General of Canada either so it didn't cost me anything.
Her Excellency the Right Honourable Adrienne Clarkson
Governor General of Canada
Rideau Hall
1 Sussex Drive
Ottawa, Ontario
K1A 0A1
Of course my social engineering is first-class and in less than a week I had
received an autographed image of her sexcellency Ms. Clarkson in an envelope
which had been franked by the secretary to the Governor General. The frank
mark was stamped in red ink and was basically like this:
<illegible signature, looks like "Bebars Wack">
04.07.13 Secretary to the Governor General
Secretaire du Gouverneur General
Ottawa, Ontario K1A 0A1
It is interesting to me that the date of mailing is built into the stamp.
Obviously one of those fancy stamps that has the little dials to set the date,
but I've never seen one built into a larger stamp like this. Also, the name
in the frank mark is not the same name or signature as the secretary that
responded to my letter. Anyway, if you were trying to mail a letter
fraudulently "franked" with the secretary to the Governor General's "frank
mark" on it, I would think your chances for success would be very slight
unless you were to drop the letter in a mailbox outside of Rideau Hall. But
who knows?
___ _________________________
(( 7 ) (( Oldest Scam in the Book )
Surely the oldest scam in the Phackers bag of tricks is to switch the return
address with the destination address and mail it without postage. CPC will
have it Returned to Sender (RTS) free of charge. You would think this would
only work when it is mailed in the same city as the intended recipient,
however, it has been successfully perpetrated city to city. Yeah, that is
totally retarded.
___ ____________________
(( 8 ) (( Postage-Paid Abuse )
People freak out about e-mail spam, but I hate physical junk mail much more
than electronic junk mail. I can simply delete spam, and anyone with two brain
cells to rub together can figure out how to set up some simple spam filters
which reject most spam before it hits their inbox. But junk mail? For
fuck-sakes! They cram it in your mailboxes, under your doors, and leave piles
of it in the lobby of your building. It all ends up in landfills and is a major
waste of paper. Just try and make them stop forcing that shit on you. Forget
it! I've gotten into fist-fights with the fuckers delivering that crap because
they felt they had the right to cram it in my mailbox in spite of my "no junk
mail" signs and my direct requests to them to stop it. They bring garbage to
your house and you're forced to pick it up and dispose of it! And this is
legal!?
We see governments scrambling to legislate against spam, but not junk mail. At
least spam is non-polluting. So why the double-standard? Could it be that our
slave-masters simply hate spam because:
a) it's so easy for clever computer people to become exceptionally wealthy
by doing it and our slave-masters abhor "newbies" getting rich and
interfering with the status quo of the old-boys network
b) it reduces their efficiency in spying on real e-mails
I strongly suspect both reasons are true.
So what to do? Exact some revenge and vent your frustration via Postage-Paid
mail.
Postage-Paid mail (aka Business Reply Mail (BRM)) is made available to junk
mail spammers through an agreement with Canada Post. Business Reply Mail is
used by businesses, publishers, government departments, fund raisers and other
organizations to allow the recipient to respond on the sender's dime. It is
available in two pre-addressed and postage-paid formats: envelope and card.
Customers only pay for the items that are returned to them.
You've all seen them but probably never used them. The tend to look something
like this:
.----------------------------------------------------------------------.
| (1) | CANADA POST |
| # # # |----------------:
| # # # | Postage Paid |
| (2) # # # | Business Reply |
| # # # | Mail |
| # # # | 1234567 01 |
| '----------------|
| '##. ,##' |
| (3) '##.,##' |
| '##' |
| (4) 1234567891-A1A1A1-0001 |
| ||'||'.''||'.||.|.''||' |
| |
| SUCK MY SPAM LTD |
| (5) 666 ASSHOLE ST |
| DILDO NF E4T 4S5 (6) |
| |
| |
`----------------------------------------------------------------------'
(1) Business Reply Mail Indicia – The Business Reply Mail indicia is the
"postage stamp". It contains the Customer Number and Customer Sortation
Code.
(2) Three Extraction Bars – The three vertical bars to the left of the
indicia prompt the mail processing equipment to extract Business Reply
Mail items for special handling.
(3) Chevrons – The chevrons below the indicia are the Business Reply Mail
service identifier. These chevrons are not to be used on any other
Canada Post service.
(4) Business Reply Mail Bar Code and Human-Readable Line – The bar code and
the human-readable line directly above it contain the information
necessary for invoicing and delivery.
(5) Business Reply Mail Address – This area is for the spammer's company
name and the Business Reply Mail address.
(6) Business Reply Mail Postal Code – The Business Reply Mail postal code may
differ from the spammer's regular postal code. NOTE: For spammers who
have a rural address (postal code with a zero as the second character),
the postal code will remain the same.
So when you see these -- mail them. Every one you drop back into a mailbox
costs the junk mail spammer money. When I get ones on envelopes I like to take
the other junk mail I received that day and stuff it in the envelope and mail
them the other spammer's garbage. I'll often collect all the other BRM
envelopes other people discard and stuff those full of junk mail too. It's very
therapeutic. You often get these kinds of things from credit card companies.
Those are my favorite as credit card companies are nothing more than cock-
sucking shit-eaters. (Note: I've NEVER had a credit card in my life and I NEVER
will.)
The truly devious could photocopy the Business Reply Mail a few hundred or
thousand times and dump them into several mailboxes around town. Ho ho ho
that's gotta hurt!
Or if you're really adventurous you could scan a piece of Business Reply Mail
into your computer, doctor the return address to wherever you want it to go
instead, and try using it to send whatever you want for free. I don't know if
it would get there, but it would be fun to try. Of course the recipient might
have some explaining to do if Canada Post catches on. But who says you have
to mail it to someone you like?
___ _______________________________
(( 9 ) (( POSTpac / POSTroute / POSTcct )
POSTpac is Canada Post Corporations packet switched data network. It is based
on the X.25 protocol and its DNIC (Data Network Identification Code) is 3038.
CPC operates their Wide Area Network based on Motorola's Codex Frame Relay
Switch and also included is a large FDDI (Fiber Distributed Data Interface)
based campus which services over 3000 users supporting protocols such as Novell
IPX, TCP/IP, DECnet, LAT, and XNS. The FDDI LAN uses a token ring media access
control protocol and operates at 100Mbps.
Network management platforms such as Digital Polycenter, SunNet Manager, HP
Openview, Cisco Works, and Synoptics Optivity are used for managing and
troubleshooting the network. The Digital POLYCENTER (DECmcc) Network Management
Platform runs on a Digital VAX Model 4000-90 for the purpose of managing and
monitoring DECnet traffic over CPC's POSTcct and POSTpac networks. Cisco Works
and Synoptics' OPTIVITY Network Management Platforms are ran on Sun Sparc 10
workstations. Chipcom's On-line Hub Management Module is utilized on an HP
Openview Network Management Station.
Other network hardware includes DECnet Phase IV routers and end nodes, X25
Routers/DEMSAs, as well as Datability Terminal Servers and the complete line
of Cisco Multi-protocol Router Products. Novell networked PCs are used for the
purpose of X-Windowing to the various Network Management Platforms using the
TCP/IP network transport.
Clearly one bitching high-end network. And that is all I know about that. Good
luck finding further information on this topic.
____ ___________
(( 1o ) (( Phonebook )
8oo-267-1177 Product & Sales Info / Customer Service
8oo-26o-7678 Product & Sales Info (business)
416-979-8822 Customer Service (international)
8oo-267-2797 Customer Service (TDD)
8oo-565-4362 Product & Sales Info (stamps & collectibles)
877-376-1212 Product & Sales Info / Support (epost)
877-269-9711 Product & Sales Info (epost fax)
888-55o-6333 Distribution Services: Priority Courier/Xpresspost/Skypak/Parcels
8oo-267-7651 Billing & Credit
613-734-9o92 Billing & Credit Fax
613-734-8888 Corporate Resource Center
877-2o2-2292 Free order entry software (eSOM)
8oo-277-4799 Free distribution services software (Expediter)
866-511-o546 PosteCS support (web secure mail & e-messaging)
8oo-363-3459 Address Management Help Line
____ ___________
(( 11 ) (( Resources )
Canada Post Corporation Website - http://www.canadapost.ca
Postal code lookup, postal outlet lookup, asstd. reference materials, ...
epost - http://www.epost.ca
Receive and pay your bills online. Good grief, like I'd trust CPC with that
kind of information.
A Brief History of Postal Hacking - 2600 Magazine, Vol.15-No.1, Spring 1998
Postal Hacking - 2600 Magazine, Vol.8-No.3, Autumn 1991
Postnet Programs - 2600 Magazine, Vol.8-No.4, Winter 1991-92
Off the Hook, December 18, 1991
http://www.2600.com/offthehook/1991/1291.html
____ __________________
(( 12 ) (( Revision History )
2oo4-o8-o1 - V0O 0O1: The first version. Duh.
2oo5-11-o4 - V0O 0O2: Added 'Postage-Paid Abuse' section and 'Revision
History'.
8< - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Copyright (c) 2oo4 - 2oo5 Hack Canada
www.hackcanada.com
|| | ||| | || || |
-
cool i read the whole thing.
interesting read. it doesn't change much about how i deal with mail though.
the part about mailing junk mail back to credit card companies or whoever sent it is interesting though - it is therapeutic for you but does nothing to damage the companies you so hate. it probably just makes some joe-schmoe's life a bit harder
-
Kick ass post, I love the thing about mailing junk mail back haha. I have known many people what "wash" stamps. As it is possible to easily remove the ink from American stamps and reuse them.
-
Nice guide, i will try to resend junk mail to people i don't like ;D
-
Nice post...