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Amazon Plants Fake Packages in Delivery Trucks to 'Trap' Drivers Who Are Stealing

posted by chromas on Friday September 21 2018, @03:15PM   Printer-friendly
from the ♪I've-been-caught-stealing-once-when-I-was-5♪ dept.

MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for SoyCow1984

Amazon uses fake packages to catch delivery drivers who are stealing, according to sources with knowledge of the practice.

The company plants the packages — internally referred to as "dummy" packages — in the trucks of drivers at random. The dummy packages have fake labels and are often empty.

[...] During deliveries, drivers scan the labels of every package they deliver. When they scan a fake label on a dummy package, an error message will pop up.

When this happens, drivers might call their supervisors to address the problem, or keep the package in their truck and return it to an Amazon warehouse at the end of their shift.

Drivers, in theory, could also choose to steal the package. The error message means the package isn't detected in Amazon's system. As a result, it could go unnoticed if the package were to go missing.

"If you bring the package back, you are innocent. If you don't, you're a thug," said Sid Shah, a former manager for DeliverOL, a courier company that delivers packages for Amazon.

Source: https://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-sets-traps-for-drivers-2018-9

Original Submission

 
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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 21 2018, @04:15PM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 21 2018, @04:15PM (#738201)

    When they do drone delivery this will be possible.

  • (Score: 2) by DannyB on Friday September 21 2018, @05:22PM

    by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Friday September 21 2018, @05:22PM (#738251) Journal

    It will also be possible when Amazon does Star Trek transporter style delivery.

    But will it be possible before then?

    --
    The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.

  • (Score: 2) by VLM on Friday September 21 2018, @05:23PM

    by VLM (445) on Friday September 21 2018, @05:23PM (#738252)

    When they do drone delivery this will be possible.

    The problem with drone delivery is they already have warehouse employees dropping off boxes on their way home, and Ford/Toyota/GM and the medical industrial complex already did all the R+D at zero cost to Amazon, whereas drones are expensive to invent.

    If you want your hello kitty tee shirt delivered at precisely 10:30am they just gotta send the warehouse guy out with it at 10am, no big deal, much cheaper than inventing shark robots with lasers on their heads or whatever.