Police Use of Social Media Surveillance Software is Escalating

https://www.aclu.org/blog/free-future/police-use-social-media-surveillance-software-escalating-and-activists-are-digital

by CapitalistCartr • 10 years ago

93 61 10 years ago

aclu.org

gerbilly• 10 years ago

It goes without saying that speaking out against police violence or government overreach shouldn’t land you in a surveillance database. But it can, and it does.

People need to realize is that social sites are voluntary surveillance platforms to begin with.

In the best of cases they surveil you to learn what advertisements to show you, but of course once the infrastructure is built, it can be put to other uses.

Social media gives the government and spy agencies undreamed of power. They don't have to create a file on each citizen, the citizen will create and update it for them!

cryoshon4• 10 years ago

Social media gives the government and spy agencies undreamed of power. They don't have to create a file on each citizen, the citizen will create and update it for them!

Which is exactly why accessing this kind of public and innocuous info needs to require a warrant when the police do it. Unreasonable surveillance/stalking of an individual is not acceptable.

We also need to clarify what "public" social media postings really mean. The intent is for a limited audience of peers to recieve postings, not the entire world, and not the police. Conflating a desire to communicate with friends with a desire to be surveilled is a mis-step that the police and state are happy to abuse.

pc863• 10 years ago

The intent is for a limited audience of peers to recieve postings, not the entire world, and not the police.

You can make statements to the police that will cause you to be arrested, convicted, and imprisoned - it does not matter one bit what your "intent" was. Social media posts are no different.

If you make a public Facebook post admitting to a murder, the police should not need to get a warrant based on other evidence to get that post then arrest you.

pjc503• 10 years ago

No, this is bonkers. It's like trying to defeat racial profiling by requiring policemen to wear horse-blinkers. Public is public; if you meant to send it to a limited audience, send it to that audience.

Otherwise you end up with bizarre conclusions such as police twitter accounts requiring a court order to follow someone.

A certain amount of what police properly do is "surveillance" - of a particular area or situation. What does become a problem is the use of directed police attention as harassment, for political purposes, or in a racial or otherwise discriminatory way.

mikestew3• 10 years ago

The intent is for a limited audience of peers to recieve postings

That might be your intent, but whoo boy, do I have news for you: that's not the way it works, it's not how it was designed to work, and it's not how "they" tell you it works. Your "intent" has nothing to do with it.

If you wish to keep your audience small, Facebook and Twitter aren't the way to do it. But long before "social media" showed up, we had means to keep things to a limited audience, things which do require a warrant to access.

panic3• 10 years ago

Sure, but what's the alternative? Social media is too involved in most people's lives for them to just leave. Maybe we should have legal restrictions on what data can be collected.

ryandrake2• 10 years ago

The alternative is not using social media. Are you really saying it's impossible?

EliRivers• 10 years ago

Overt threats: Unions.

Them commies are everywhere.

marcusgarvey• 10 years ago

Except police unions. The cops think those are just fine.

hood_syntax• 10 years ago

The hypocrisy is palpable...

Dowwie• 10 years ago

How are cash-strapped police departments funding social media surveillance?

pjc503• 10 years ago

They're choosing to make it a priority. Crime threatens the public, but activists "threaten" the police - by trying to make them accountable.

"identify so-called “threats to public safety” by monitoring hashtags such as #BlackLivesMatter, #DontShoot, #ImUnarmed, #PoliceBrutality, and #ItsTimeforChange."

rm_-rf_slash2• 10 years ago

It's also easy to persuade people that riots could happen at any moment and could not only harm people and property, but reputation. If an area is seen as out of control, people will not go there to shop, businesses will not establish themselves there, and the city sees its tax base dry up.

None of these things even have to happen to get people scared enough to vote yes.

cryoshon4• 10 years ago

Alternatively, fighting traditional crime does not actually require that much of their budget, so they try to open up new avenues of finding criminality in order to ensure they continue to get the same budget.

bediger4000• 10 years ago

It's probably easier to monitor ordinary, lawful political conversations on social media, than it is to monitor people taking some steps toward confidential, conspiratorial conversations.

Also, the social media stuff directly concerns the police image, and stature in society. Funding observations of criminals and miscreants is just their regular job. They don't get as much status for just doing their job as they might lose from institutionalized accountability.

rectang• 10 years ago

They can save money by outsourcing surveillance to Iran, whose monitoring of social media was very effective in countering the Green Revolution.

TeMPOraL5• 10 years ago

It's pretty cheap, I guess. Cheap and easy to paint as effective (regardless of actual effectiveness).

rm_-rf_slash2• 10 years ago

It goes without saying that this kind of survellience is not going to stop, possibly ever. Therefore, it is only fair that the tools and data collected by public servants is made equally accessible to the public. This provides a check on unprecedented power and the inevitable corruption that our current course is barreling towards.

white-flame• 10 years ago

At the very least, personal privacy rights be clarified and encoded into law. Even if disreputable surveillance continues, it should then be formally classified as corrupt if not straight-up illegal activity.

nxc18• 10 years ago

Activists broadcast messages publicly on social media; public servants read them.

How is this controversial? If you want privacy, surely you should understand that sharing on the web isn't the way to go?

In a lot of these cases where protests turn into violent riots a police response is necessary, if at a minimum to keep the peaceful protestors safe. Using publicly available information to facilitate that makes perfect sense.

cryoshon4• 10 years ago

The concern is that the police are considering peaceful activism as hostile intent, and escalating scrutiny accordingly.

Furthermore, more monitoring of activists provides more chances for incitement/provocation by the police as needed.

thatcat• 10 years ago

the police are considering peaceful activism as hostile

Exactly. Police are willfully misinterpreting participation in a conversation intended to raise awareness about police misconduct in an attempt to intimidate activists into remaining silent.

Using social media as a surveillance apparatus to manage their public image through intimidation is essentially cyber bullying.

okwhatthe2• 10 years ago

You're forgetting that in many cases these protests turn violent as a direct result of police confrontation. In that regard these surveillance operations only increase the likelihood of escalating tensions between citizens and police.

sheraz2• 10 years ago

Please explain that line of thinking. How does increased surveillance increase violence?

If anything it gives law enforcement a heads up of where thier presence might be needed.

mc32• 10 years ago

There's inherent tension in group demonstrations. Typically most people want to peacefully protest but you also have an element of anarchists and hooligans who jump on the bandwagon and counterintuitively do more harm than good for a movement (by turning "regular hard working folk" against the movement due to needless violence and destruction).

That said, I agree with OP, if you're posting in a public forum, don't turn around and then say you expect privacy. The internet is a broadcast medium, in this sense, you can't push the genie back in the bottle once you let it out.

So, if you're going to say provocative things which don't broadcast them and then expect only your followers to pay attention.

gumby• 10 years ago

You're forgetting that in many cases these protests turn violent as a direct result of police confrontation.

I don't know that either of your assertions is true. I suspect very very few demonstrations turn violent (a negligible number) and I suspect that a small but significant number (maybe as high as 1/3) of those that do, turn violent due to police involvement.

But I have seen no numbers; they could be the opposite for all I know. The episodic nature of how news reporting is done (where most events are treated sui generis or are arbitrarily linked due to the structure of reporting) makes it impossible to tell unless someone actually does a study.

There is nothing in principle wrong with various entities monitoring public statements. In terms of policing there are several structural problems in how it is performed, in California, the US, and in the world at large. I doubt anyone would disagree.

brbrodude2• 10 years ago

So, so naive

pc863• 10 years ago

Feel free to actually contribute rather than making snide comments about the commenter.

infodroid• 10 years ago

Nobody should be in a police database just for joining a union or showing up at a protest.

panic3• 10 years ago

How does any part of "monitoring hashtags such as #BlackLivesMatter, #DontShoot, #ImUnarmed, #PoliceBrutality, and #ItsTimeforChange" work toward keeping peaceful protestors safe? These people are the peaceful protestors.

cryoshon4• 10 years ago

Why don't we have police/state targeted surveillance software? A million data points about police activity on social networks (on their personal accounts) would be a trove of enlightenment for the public. It's clear that they won't be transparent or share info about their personal or professional activities willingly... but we need the information regardless of their intransigence. Why should they be allowed to have privacy when they are so keen on abusing ours?

I'm sure they feel the same way about us, but the honest truth is that going tit-for-tat against them re: surveillance works far better for the public as a whole.

pc863• 10 years ago

This is something I would donate quite a bit of time and money to.

draugadrotten• 10 years ago

surveillance works far better for the public as a whole.

A good read on the topic from Dr David Brin, http://www.davidbrin.com/transparentsociety.html

throw2016• 10 years ago

There is an worrying dissonance in democratic societies that treats protest like a paranoid regime would.

The use of surveillance is highly questionable for citizens exercising basic rights. Military grade equipment and a heavy handed approach suggests a level of paranoia that does not seem at ease with basic democratic principles.

Protests, large crowds and activism are essential aspects of a vibrant society, they also have potential for volatility and disruption. If you can't accept this and put law and order above all else to the extent that you need to monitor and confront citizens how far away are you really from a police state?

Police Use of Social Media Surveillance Software is Escalating

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