“Big Brother is Watching You.” – George Orwell, 1984

According to Yahoo News, the United States Postal Service (USPS) has been collecting data on Americans’ social media posts, secretly of course.

A March 16 government bulletin that was obtained by Yahoo News reveals that the USPS’s law enforcement wing has been tracking American citizens’ social media posts and activities, and they gather data on a whole range of topics from inflammatory posts and planned protests. It goes on to share their data across federal departments and agencies as part of a program called the Internet Covert Operations Program, or iCOP. Isn’t that a cute name?

The document marked “law enforcement sensitive,” noted an analysis of planned activity for March 20, and was delivered through Homeland Security’s Fusion Centers, which are “state-owned and operated centers that serve as focal points in states and major urban areas for the receipt, analysis, gathering and sharing of threat-related information between State, Local, Tribal and Territorial (SLTT), federal and private sector partners.”

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