United States Postal Service announces new security measures to address increase in mail theft
DALLAS (CBSNewsTexas.com) – Stolen mail, check fraud and attacks on letter carriers – the U.S. Postal Service has seen enough and that why it has announced new security measures to hopefully address an increase in all three of those crimes.
CBS News Texas has been exposing mail security lapses for months and shows us what changes are coming to better secure your mail.
The U.S. Postal Service says it had around 38,000 reports of mail theft from collection boxes across the country last year.
Through only the first five months of this year, there have already been 25,000 reports of stolen mail.
"During the last three years or so, we are seeing a dramatic increase in the volume of stolen mail," said Dr. David Maimon, with Georgia State University Evidence Based Cyber Security.
Maimon has been analyzing the problem and posts his disturbing findings from the dark web of criminals showing off stolen checks and personal info that's used for fraud.
Some of what he's found include arrow keys that sell for thousands of dollars.
They can each open hundreds of collection boxes and have made letter carriers a new target for robbery, including several so far this year in North Texas.
That's why the postal service hrolling out security improvements that include
- 12,000 High Security Blue Collection Boxes
- 49,000 Electronic Locks
- 12,000 high security blue collection boxes and 49,000 electronic locks to replace the outdated arrow locks
"Changing the locks is not really the solution," Maimon said.
Maimon worries that whatever new locks are installed will still make letter carriers vulnerable to robbery.
"So instead of targeting the mail carrier, and robbing them of the arrow key they will simply rob them from the other device that is being used to open the mailbox
Earlier this year, CBS News Texas reported on overflowing collection boxes in multiple North Texas cities that were allowing mail to easily be stolen.
New collection boxes are being designed to better protect a lot of people who still depend on mail to pay bills.
The Postal Service is also implementing new changes to prevent counterfeit postage and change of address fraud.