Automated package delivery receptacle

The automated package delivery receptacle provides a faster, easier, more delivery-person friendly, and more reliable method of ensuring that packages delivered to unattended locations are not stolen by porch pirates. The receptacle automatically detects any package that is placed on top of it. As soon as the person who delivered the package has departed, the top surface lifts up above the body of the receptacle, rotates to a vertical position, and drops the package into the interior compartment. The top then reverses its motion and returns to its resting horizontal position, locked and ready for another delivery. The receptacle's mechanism does not encroach at all on the receptable's interior compartment space while cycling. It is powered by a 12-volt automobile type battery connected to a motor controller that is programmed to drive a high-speed linear actuator to complete its open/close cycle in less than twenty seconds.