US Postal Service Is Secretly Monitoring And Reporting Social Media Posts

A new report shows that the U.S. Postal Service has been secretly running a program that monitors American users’ social media posts and shares the information with different government agencies, according to a document acquired by Yahoo News. According to the document, the law enforcement arm of the U.S. Postal Service has been engaged in a previously unknown surveillance effort, known as the Internet Covert Operations Program, to comb through social media sites for “inflammatory” posts, which are then reported to the government, Yahoo News reported Wednesday. “Analysts with the United States Postal Inspection Service (USPIS) Internet Covert Operations Program (iCOP) monitored significant activity regarding planned protests occurring internationally and domestically on March 20, 2021,” the document, marked as “law enforcement sensitive,” says. “Locations and times have been identified for these protests, which are being distributed online across multiple social media platforms, to include right-wing leaning Parler and Telegram accounts.” The document includes several different screenshots of posts from Parler, Facebook, and other social media sites, and says that the surveillance program is monitoring these sites to identify any possible threats. “iCOP analysts are currently monitoring these social media channels for any potential threats stemming from the scheduled protests and will disseminate intelligence updates as needed.”...MORE

Is the Post Office actually authorized to do this? I'm not the only one asking:

Rachel Levinson-Waldman, deputy director of the Brennan Center for Justice’s liberty and national security program, said that the Postal Service may not have the legal authority to carry out surveillance of social media activity, according to Yahoo News. “If the individuals they’re monitoring are carrying out or planning criminal activity, that should be the purview of the FBI,” said Levinson-Waldman. “If they’re simply engaging in lawfully protected speech, even if it’s odious or objectionable, then monitoring them on that basis raises serious constitutional concerns.”

Why the Post Office? Again, others are questioning this:

 “It’s a mystery,” University of Chicago law professor Geoffrey Stone told Yahoo News. “I don’t understand why the government would go to the Postal Service for examining the internet for security issues.”

It appears Senator Cruz makes an accurate observation: 

In a tweet about the Postal Service’s program, Republican Texas Sen. Ted Cruz wrote, “Finally, an answer to the question: “Is there any federal agency that’s not spying on Americans?”