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4. USPS
Fraudsters love to hijack the trust and authority we place in government agencies and institutions from the IRS to the FBI or local police. The United States Postal Office dates back nearly 250 years and has been delivering mail to businesses and households since the country was founded. A message from the Postal Service carries a tone of official authority that is hard for most retailers to match. Add the fact that at any given moment half the country genuinely is waiting on a package, and a fake USPS text finds believers at enormous scale.
How USPS is being impersonated
Popular impersonation lures to pay attention to:
Redelivery-fee texts
A package is "held" pending a small redelivery fee, with a link to a convincing USPS-lookalike site. The two-dollar fee is bait; the card number you enter is the prize.
Address-confirmation requests
"Your address is incomplete" messages that harvest personal details and card numbers on a fake USPS form.
Customs and postage-due notices
The same kit dressed up for international packages. Variants of these kits also power the EZPass and toll-road texts that have surged nationally.
Second channel checks
When you want to be sure
- 1
Track packages only on the official USPS site.
USPS does not text you links unless you explicitly requested tracking updates for a specific package. Go to usps.com and enter your tracking number yourself.
- 2
Use Informed Delivery.
USPS's free Informed Delivery service (informeddelivery.usps.com) shows you exactly what mail and packages are actually on the way — a built-in second channel for any "delivery problem" claim.
- 3
Report and delete.
Forward scam texts to 7726 (SPAM) and email a screenshot to spam@uspis.gov. USPS doesn't charge redelivery fees by text.