Uncle Big Brother Sam Is Watching
Via Lisa Simeone, tweeting the word 'virus' could mean your Twitter account is read by U.S. government spies, blogs legitgov at Citizens for Legitimate Government:
Fake profiles used by Department of Homeland Security, says privacy group --List of keywords flags 'danger' signal --DHS may attempt to identify users from their accounts --Keywords include 'virus' and 'drill' 28 Dec 2011.The Department of Homeland Security makes fake Twitter and Facebook profiles for the specific purpose of scanning the networks for 'sensitive' words - and tracking people who use them. Simply using a word or phrase from the DHS's 'watch' list could mean that spies from the government read your posts, investigate your account, and attempt to identify you from it, acccording to an online privacy group.
The words which attract attention range from ones seemingly related to diseases or bioweapons such as 'human to animal' and 'outbreak' to other, more obscure words such as 'drill' and 'strain'.
Now, granted, the story he/she links to is from The Daily Mail in the UK, which I value as a source for truth like I'd value some drug addict telling me he hasn't had any in, like, forever.
But, here's more from EPIC (the Electronic Privacy Information Center):
EPIC has filed a Freedom of information Act lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security to force disclosure of the details of the agency's social network monitoring program. In news reports and a Federal Register notice, the DHS has stated that it will routinely monitor the public postings of users on Twitter and Facebook. The agency plans to create fictitious user accounts and scan posts of users for key terms. User data will be stored for five years and shared with other government agencies.The legal authority for the DHS program remains unclear. EPIC filed the lawsuit after the DHS failed to reply to an April 2011 FOIA request.
Links in the paragraph above are live at EPIC's site.
Of course, when I tweeted this, I suggested that everybody retweet this post -- complete with the word "virus":
@amyalkon Uncle Big Brother Sam Is Watching: Tweeting "virus" could mean flagging of yr Twitter account by govt (everybody RT!) http://bit.ly/svS42D
If they're going to be watching some of us on the most dubious of reasons, they're going to be watching a whole lot of us, I hope.
And no, I'm not against catching terrorists -- quite the contrary. But, I'm for meaningful measures to do that and not measures that masquerade as terrorism-stopping but chip into our privacy and civil liberties.
Hasn't Echelon been doing this for nearly 2 decades?
Evert Bopp at December 29, 2011 3:27 PM
My computer caught the Ellen Degenres virus. It no longer accepts disks.
Eric at December 29, 2011 3:38 PM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2011/12/29/uncle_big_broth.html#comment-2883324">comment from EricThat's very funny.
Amy Alkon
at December 29, 2011 3:41 PM
Well, in the government's defense, unless your tweets are protected - and who does that? - they can be read by anyone anywhere. Part of what makes Twitter compelling is that anyone can read and talk to anyone on the network. The lack of privacy is a feature, not a bug. Of course the government is data mining on Twitter. It would be dumb not to, given that we know terrorists and criminals use it. I am a huge believer in privacy, and encourage people to encrypt their devices and use https anywhere it's available. But one really has no expectation of privacy in statements they literally broadcast to th world.
Christopher at December 29, 2011 6:43 PM
Christopher, indeed no one has an expectation of privacy in public -- and the internet is public. The twist here is that DHS has been making noises for some time about ratcheting up the designations "domestic extremist" and "domestic terrorist." That bit of paranoia, combined with the NDAA, make the threat more than just data mining.
We're already treated like terrorists just to get on a plane. And, more and more -- as some of us predicted -- everywhere else we choose to travel as well. Now we're going to be treated like terrorists because of vocabulary??
Virus, drill, strain, gun, terror, plot, outbreak, animal, lockdown, explosion, breakout, hostage, exercise, brute force, expansion, can and abel, meth lab, brownout, riot, nuclear threat, brute forcing, dirty bomb, collapse, trojan, recovery, deaths, collapse, virus, virus virus!
There. I've saved them the trouble.
Lisa Simeone at December 30, 2011 4:43 AM
I didn't get the drill I wanted for Christmas.
MarkD at December 30, 2011 5:38 AM
Why should this be a surprise?
Even with the high noise-to-signal ratio on the Internet, the role Twitter played in the "Arab Spring" uprisings is noticed by all governments.
What? The people are coordinating opposition to us? That has to be stopped!
And hey - we have drills at our nuclear facility almost daily!
Radwaste at December 30, 2011 5:45 AM
Does anyone even use Twitter any longer?? What's next?!? - MySpace monitoring? Perhaps they'll start snooping on the AOL chat rooms.
But Christopher is right, this is like complaining that government 'spies' are listening to things that people say on the radio.
Tweeter at December 30, 2011 6:29 AM
If DHS really is doing this, they're even dumber than I thought. What a waste of money.
Cousin Dave at December 30, 2011 12:03 PM
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