The drawbacks of postal banking, though, extend far beyond the fact that they are obviously superfluous.
The USPS has a disturbing track-record of spying on Americans and unwittingly allowing criminals to access private information. In April, Yahoo News reported that the agency runs an investigation unit known as the Internet Covert Operations Program (iCOP) which sounds more like a CIA op than a postal division.
According to the news outlet, “[t]he work involves having analysts trawl through social media sites to look for what the document describes as ‘inflammatory’ postings and then sharing that information across government agencies.” As if that isn’t creepy enough, the agency uses facial recognition software during internet searches “to help identify unknown targets in an investigation or locate additional social media accounts for known individuals.”