alt Hacker NewsIs it uncommon/impossible to ask for the federally-brokered in-person procedure in the US?
(The way I know it: Local court or police officer shows up at our office later that day and hands over a printout matching the request that we had been unable to confirm, on request of federal authority, in turn on request of the authority demanding we hand over some customers data. Those two requests utilizing government agency-internal auth mechanisms we do not need to know or care about.)
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> Those two requests utilizing government agency-internal auth mechanisms we do not need to know or care about.
Most likely:
> and the whole thing was PDFs from .gov-ish email addresses
But I guess this moves the liability for answering fake requests to the local branch.
You'd still want to verify that with the court or authority? I've been served before and sometimes it's just a person in street clothes who hands you an envelope. And even if it's a court bailiff or officer or something like that, would you be able to distinguish a real uniform, ID and badge from a fake one?