Systems described herein for controlling, requesting, and coordinating the creation and generation of labels can be a label broker, providing a centralized location for storing label information created by various entities, and managing the requests for generation of physical labels coming from various sources and entities.

Postage generation and management systems are provided in which hardware security modules (HSMs) are used to perform cryptographic operations instead of conventional postal security devices. Virtual PSD data is stored in a database and processed by the HSMs, allowing for improved security and scalability.

Systems described herein for controlling, requesting, and coordinating the creation and generation of labels can be a label broker, providing a centralized location for storing label information created by various entities, and managing the requests for generation of physical labels coming from various sources and entities.

Systems, methods, and articles of manufacture for protecting personal data in digital and physical worlds in which the personal data of a networked computing system is used for physical world communications. Preauthorized permissions or rules of a computing system specify how personal data of a first user, as a user that will receive a mailer, can be used by a different, second user to communicate with the first user in the physical world by sending the first user a mailer. The mailer may be a greeting card is generated and includes personal data (such as recipient name and address) to be sent to the receiving user, but the sender is not provided with the receiving user's personal data such that the sending user may not know the receiving user's address or even the receiving user's real name.

Aspects of the technology described herein provide an activatable postage. As an initial step, the activatable postage is printed on a media, such as an envelope or sticker. Initially, the activatable postage has no postage value and will not have any value until activated. Each instance of activatable postage comprises a unique identifier encoded in a machine-readable format. Postage value is added to the activatable postage through an activation process. In order to activate an individual instance of activatable postage, the unique identifier encoded in the activatable postage needs to be provided to the activation application. At the end of the activation process, a central database is updated to associate the unique identifier with a postal value calculated during activation. When the Postal Service receives an item with activatable postage it validates the activatable postage and then deactivates the activatable postage by updating the central database.

Aspects of the technology described herein provide an activatable postage. As an initial step, the activatable postage is printed on a media, such as an envelope or sticker. Initially, the activatable postage has no postage value and will not have any value until activated. Each instance of activatable postage comprises a unique identifier encoded in a machine-readable format. Postage value is added to the activatable postage through an activation process. In order to activate an individual instance of activatable postage, the unique identifier encoded in the activatable postage needs to be provided to the activation application. At the end of the activation process, a central database is updated to associate the unique identifier with a postal value calculated during activation. When the Postal Service receives an item with activatable postage it validates the activatable postage and then deactivates the activatable postage by updating the central database.

Systems described herein for controlling, requesting, and coordinating the creation and generation of labels can be a label broker, providing a centralized location for storing label information created by various entities, and managing the requests for generation of physical labels coming from various sources and entities.

Systems described herein for controlling, requesting, and coordinating the creation and generation of labels can be a label broker, providing a centralized location for storing label information created by various entities, and managing the requests for generation of physical labels coming from various sources and entities.

Aspects of the technology described herein provide an activatable postage. The activatable postage is printed on a media, such as an envelope or sticker. Initially, the activatable postage has no postage value and may not have any value until activated. Each instance of activatable postage can include a unique identifier encoded in a machine-readable format. Postage value is added to the activatable postage through an activation process. To activate an individual instance of activatable postage, the unique identifier encoded in the activatable postage needs to be provided to the activation application. At the end of the activation process, a central database is updated to associate the unique identifier with a postal value calculated during activation. When the Postal Service receives an item with activatable postage it validates the activatable postage and then deactivates the activatable postage by updating the central database.

Systems described herein for controlling, requesting, and coordinating the creation and generation of labels can be a label broker, providing a centralized location for storing label information created by various entities, and managing the requests for generation of physical labels coming from various sources and entities.