A prominent internet privacy group is suing the U.S. Postal Service (USPS), alleging that its social media surveillance program violates federal law.
EPIC seeks to have a federal judge suspend iCOP until the USPS at least conducts and publishes such a review, as required by the E-Government Act.
“Parlor users have commented about their intent to use the rallies to engage in violence. Image 3 on the right is a screenshot from Parlor indicating two users discussing the event as an opportunity to engage in a ‘fight’ and to ‘do serious damage,’” the March 16 USPS memo reads, circulated ahead of the “World Wide Rally—For Freedom, Peace, & Human Rights” event scheduled for March 20.
“No intelligence is available to suggest the legitimacy of these threats.”
“It is unclear why the USPS, of all government agencies and the only one devoted to the delivery of Americans’ mail, is taking on the role of intelligence collection,” the letter reads. “The type of general review of social media alleged in the reporting does not indicate that the posts reviewed by iCOP are related to the protection and security of USPS, its postal routes, its employees, or the mail generally.”
“What’s worse, he denied iCOP was used to monitor social media activities, but in the very same breath, said his analysts use iCOP to do exactly this.”
Following its initial April report, Yahoo News revealed more details about iCOP in May. According to Yahoo, the USPS also used internet surveillance tools to monitor social media to track potential violence at protests following the death of George Floyd.
Around that time, EPIC also filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request in May, seeking records about iCOP, including its privacy impact assessment.
In EPIC’s lawsuit, the group said that the postal service “failed to locate” its privacy impact assessment in response to the FOIA request—suggesting that one doesn’t exist.
“Defendants have unlawfully initiated [iCOP] ... and used facial recognition and social media monitoring tools to initiate or significantly modify collections of personal information under the iCOP without first conducting and publishing the full and complete Privacy Impact Assessment(s) required by ... the E-Government Act,” EPIC stated in its Aug. 12 filing.
In a separate statement about the lawsuit, EPIC expressed skepticism at the notion that the USPS should be conducting broad intelligence operations such as iCOP.
Representatives for the USPS didn’t respond to a request for comment by press time. The postal service has previously defended iCOP as a legal open-source intelligence operation designed to protect its employees.
“This review of publicly available open-source information, including news reports and social media, is one piece of a comprehensive security and threat analysis, and the information obtained is the same information anyone can access as a private citizen,” a U.S. Postal Inspection Service spokesperson told Yahoo News in May.
“News report and social media listening activity helps protect the 644,000 men and women who work for the postal service by ensuring they are able to avoid potentially volatile situations while working to process and deliver the nation’s mail every day.”