This week, U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., brought back the ‘‘USPIS Surveillance Protection Act.”
The bill would “defund the Internet Covert Operations Program (iCOP)” which the congressman’s office insisted was “an illegal domestic surveillance program operated by the United States Postal Inspection Service (USPIS).” The bill “would prohibit any federal funds, including amounts available in the Postal Service Fund, from being used by USPIS to carry out iCOP, or any other similar program.”
The U.S. Postal Service’s Office of Inspector General (USPSOIG) defines the program quite different.
“The U.S. Postal Inspection Service’s Analytics and Cybercrime Program provides investigative, forensic, and analytical support to field divisions and headquarters. A core component of this program is the Internet Covert Operations Program (iCOP), established in 2018 to provide analytics support for online investigations. Analysts respond to requests for assistance from postal inspectors and proactively gather intelligence using cryptocurrency analysis, open-source intelligence, and social media analysis. In April 2021, iCOP was renamed the Analytics Team,” the USPOSIG noted.
Gaetz pointed to a Yahoo News report from 2021 which “exposed USPIS’ iCOP surveillance government bulletin that was distributed by the Department of Homeland Security” as the “bulletin reported the program’s findings of ‘inflammatory’ posts on social media accounts, including on Facebook, Parler, and Telegram.”
The congressman also noted the U.S. House Oversight and Reform Committee, pressed the USPS Inspector General on the matter last year leading to a “report stating that ‘certain proactive searches iCOP conducted using an open-source intelligence tool from February to April 2021 exceed the Postal Inspection Service’s law enforcement authority.’” However, the congressman’s office insisted “there has been no indication that USPIS has shut down iCOP, likely meaning that this surveillance program is still violating Americans’ privacy and seeking to curb their First Amendment rights.”
Gaetz offered his reasons for introducing the bill.
“The Postal Service should be focused on delivering the mail on time and on budget, not running a covert surveillance program to monitor political behavior on social media. This program is not only outside USPIS’ jurisdiction and infringes on American citizens’ civil liberties but is more evidence of the government-sanctioned spying on its own citizens. Congress must immediately abolish this program,” Gaetz said.
The bill was sent to the Oversight and Reform Committee. So far, there is no companion measure in the U.S. Senate and no co-sponsors in the House.
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