Mail cover is a law enforcement investigative technique in which the

United States Postal Service The United States Postal Service (USPS), also known as the Post Office, U.S. Mail, or Postal Service, is an independent agency of the executive branch of the United States federal government responsible for providing postal service in the ...

, acting at the request of a law enforcement agency, records information from the outside of letters and parcels before they are delivered and then sends the information to the agency that requested it. The Postal Service grants mail cover surveillance requests for about 30 days and may extend them for up to 120 days. Mail covers can be requested to investigate criminal activity or to protect

national security National security, or national defence, is the security and defence of a sovereign state, including its citizens, economy, and institutions, which is regarded as a duty of government. Originally conceived as protection against military att ...

. On average the Postal Service grants 15,000 to 20,000 criminal activity requests each year. It rarely denies a request. Mail cover is defined by the U.S. Postal Regulations 39 CFR 233.3 and the

Internal Revenue Manual The Internal Revenue Manual (IRM) is an official compendium of internal guidelines for personnel of the United States Internal Revenue Service (IRS). History The IRM was made publicly available through the Freedom of Information Act Freedom of Info ...

as follows: :Mail cover is the process by which a nonconsensual record is made of any data appearing on the outside cover of sealed or unsealed mail; or by which a record is made of the contents of any unsealed mail, as allowed by law, to obtain information to protect national security; locate a fugitive; obtain evidence of the commission or attempted commission of a crime; obtain evidence of a violation or attempted violation of a postal statute; or assist in the identification of property, proceeds, or assets forfeitable under law. As mail cover does not involve the reading of the mail but only information on the outside of the

envelope An envelope is a common packaging item, usually made of thin, flat material. It is designed to contain a flat object, such as a letter or card. Traditional envelopes are made from sheets of paper cut to one of three shapes: a rhombus, a ...

or package that could be read by anyone seeing the item anyway, it is not considered by court precedent a violation of the Fourth Amendment. However, there has been criticism of the practice by some, particularly due to the delay in mail the process might cause, though regulations prohibit mail cover from delaying mail. According to official statistics obtained through a FOIA request by the ''

National Law Journal ''The National Law Journal'' (NLJ) is an American legal periodical founded in 1978. The NLJ was created by Jerry Finkelstein, who envisioned it as a "sibling newspaper" of the ''New York Law Journal''. Originally a tabloid-sized weekly newspap ...

'', the number of mail covers in 1984 was 9,022 and increased to 14,077 in 2000. Since 2001, the Postal Service has been effectively conducting mail covers on all American postal mail as part of the

Mail Isolation Control and Tracking Mail Isolation Control and Tracking (MICT) is an imaging system employed by the United States Postal Service (USPS) that takes photographs of the exterior of every piece of mail that is processed in the United States. The Postmaster General has stat ...

program.

References

Mail cover
in West's Encyclopedia of American Law {{United States Postal Service Law enforcement techniques United States Postal Service Mass surveillance

See also

References