The U.S. Postal Service has shared information from thousands of Americans' letters and packages with law enforcement every year for the past decade, conveying the names, addresses and other details from the outside of boxes and envelopes without requiring a court order. Postal Service officials have received more than 60,000 requests from federal agents and police officers since 2015. Each request can cover days or weeks of mail sent to or from a person or address, and 97 percent of the requests were approved. The surveillance technique, known as the mail covers program, has long been used by postal inspectors to help track down suspects or evidence. The practice is legal, and the inspectors said they share only what they can see on the outside of the mail. [Sen. Ron] Wyden said in a statement, "Thousands of Americans are subjected to warrantless surveillance each year, and ... the Postal Inspection Service rubber stamps practically all of the requests they receive." He also criticized the agency for "refusing to raise its standards and require law enforcement agencies monitoring the outside of Americans' mail to get a court order, which is already required to monitor emails and texts." Anxieties over postal surveillance are classically American. In 1798, Vice President Thomas Jefferson wrote in a letter that his fears of having his private communications exposed by the "infidelities of the post office" had stopped him from "writing fully & freely."