Today the US Postal Service sent me an email inviting me to sign up with Informed Delivery. The pitch is that the USPS Mobile App will be upgraded to have access to Informed Delivery which is described as "a new, free feature that gives you the ability to see a digital preview of your incoming mail." Conveniently the Postal Service will send out grey-scale scans of the exterior of all pieces of mail arriving at the mailbox, and those scans can be viewed with the Mobile App or can be sent to ones e-mail inbox.

I'm not sure what the value is to me for this service. The big worry is that obviously it means the Postal Service is scanning the outside of every envelope, and what the heck are they doing with those scans? Who else is receiving those scans? The NSA? The FBI? Who?