UPS

While checking the tracking on a package I'm expecting via UPS, I saw an offer to register for an system, which sends an alert the day before delivery. That sounded like a good idea, but at the end of the registration, it asked about the relationship with an estranged brother of mine, with which I haven't had contact with for years. It also asked about streets that I had previously lived on, before I ever became a UPS customer.

I found it quite unsettling that UPS has, uses or needs such information to accomplish their normal business? It also makes me wonder how the information might be used otherwise? Has anyone else run into this before?

EDIT: Odd! Right after posting this, I received an email from UPS acknowledging my registration, though I had not finished the page with the questions that I mentioned. It certainly appears to be an integral part of registration, but if so, I shouldn't have received the acknowledgement yet.

Yes, I am aware of the ability to find information on people, but I still don't understand UPS's need for this info. The page says:

Maintaining the security and integrity of your shipments is extremely important to UPS. To prevent others from fraudulently redirecting your packages, please verify your identity by answering the following questions.

That statement makes sense in itself, but for anyone to redirect a package, they would have to know about it in the first place, and I doubt that is possible. One of the streets that it listed for me, which I never lived on, is the street where some people who had stolen my identity had lived, but that was ~ 7 years ago, and I would be very surprised if they were continuing to use my name to ship/receive packages with UPS today.

What is even more odd is the fact that I have two estranged brothers, but it only lists one of them and not the other. I suppose that he could be dead, but it did list his address.

arkhi said:

I don't ever remember getting this big of a breach when registering with UPS. The most they asked me was my address and that's it.

Things change.

seekermeister said:

I found it quite unsettling that UPS has, uses or needs such information to accomplish their normal business? It also makes me wonder how the information might be used otherwise? Has anyone else run into this before?

I'm registered with UPS, and needed to confirm my info earlier this year (because I hadn't logged-on in a while) but they've never asked such odd questions of me. Very interesting.

But I would say that "alerts" are not a good enough reason to register with them, what with online tracking being as accurate as it is these days. At least, not unless you get many multiple packages, or do some considerable shipping with them e.g. you run an eBay business out of your home or something. Otherwise it's simply enough to enter the tracking number and see that it's "Scheduled for delivery Dec 1" or "On truck for delivery today" etc.

I delayed submitting the information requested while pondering the situation. When I decided to go ahead, it continued to say that there was an error of some kind. I guess that it would be necessary to go through the registration process again, but at this point, I'm not inclined to do so.