Everyday Privacy

Lock Down Your Mailbox

Informed Delivery is a free USPS service that emails you grayscale scans of the mail arriving each day. It is genuinely useful, but if you do not claim your own address first, someone else can, and then they see your incoming checks, cards, and statements.

What Informed Delivery Is

Sign up and USPS emails you a daily preview, grayscale images of the letter-sized mail headed to your address, plus tracking for packages. It is a handy way to know what is coming and to spot mail that never arrives.

The Risk Nobody Mentions

Only one account can be tied to an address. If an identity thief enrolls your address before you do, they get the daily scans of your mail, new cards, bank statements, tax forms, remotely, without ever touching your mailbox.

USPS does verify identity at signup, but the safest move is simple: claim your own address first so no one else can.

Claim and Lock Your Address

Enroll yourselfGo to informeddelivery.usps.com and create an account for your address before anyone else does.

VerifyUSPS confirms your identity, often by mailing a code to the address or verifying online. Complete it so the address is locked to you.

Strong, unique passwordUse a password you use nowhere else, stored in your password manager.

Turn on two-step verificationEnable it in your USPS account so a stolen password alone cannot get in.

If Someone Already Enrolled Your Address

USPS mails a paper notice when a new Informed Delivery account is created for an address. If you get one you did not request, act on it.
Report it to the USPS Postal Inspection Service and call 1-800-ASK-USPS to dispute the enrollment.

While You Are At It

Use the free USPS Hold Mail service when you travel so mail does not pile up in the box.
A locking mailbox or a PO box stops physical mail theft, which is still how a lot of identity theft starts.
Shred anything with your name and account numbers before it hits the trash.

Common Questions

Is Informed Delivery safe to use?

Yes, and claiming it yourself is safer than leaving your address unclaimed. Protect the account with a unique password and two-step verification.

What if I do not want the daily emails?

You can still enroll to lock the address to you and then turn the notifications down. The point is to hold the account so a thief cannot.

Does this cost anything?

No. Informed Delivery and USPS Hold Mail are both free. A PO box has a fee, but the online services do not.

WANT THIS DONE FOR YOU?

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