Social Media Monitoring by Government Agencies – A Fine Line Between Privacy & Public Safety

[By Scott Juba]

Social media monitoring and surveillance is a fact of life in today’s twenty-first century communication landscape. It is a near certainty that every person reading this has had their online communication monitored.  In many cases, companies and brands track what customers and competitors are saying about them online and then use that data to inform the future decisions they make. But they are not the only ones monitoring the information people post online. Law enforcement and government agencies also use this data to make their operations as efficient as possible.

Enter Geofeedia into this equation. Geofeedia is a location-based social media monitoring tool that allows for geofencing. In other words, the service enables users to see Facebook posts, tweets, Instagram posts and more that emanate from within a certain geographic area or from an event location. Such capability is attractive to law enforcement as they look to assess the activities of individuals in the epicenter of an unfolding event. However, when the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) revealed Geofeedia was marketing its service to law enforcement as a way to track protestors and activists, the notion that law enforcement would use social media in this way raised eyebrows.

The response by the major social networks was nearly unanimous. Facebook, Twitter, Google (which owns YouTube and Picasa), Instagram (which is owned by Facebook) all cut off Geofeedia’s access to their data. Facebook’s decision is somewhat ironic considering that Facebook was a Geofeedia customer.

According to the New York Times, Geofeedia had more than 500 law enforcement agencies among its clients. But, does the fact that some of these agencies used Geofeedia to track protestors and activists constitute a serious privacy concern?  After all, if you post something publicly online, you shouldn’t be surprised if someone finds it.

It is wrong to assume that social media monitoring by law enforcement is necessarily nefarious. If a terrorist was on the loose in a major city and law enforcement could track down that terrorist by the location-based monitoring that a tool like Geofeedia provides, few would argue that is a good thing. But when the same service is used to track protestors and activists, the issue becomes murky. Remember, social media has been the lifeblood of many activist groups.

Here is where the situation gets murkier. Geofeedia’s activities allegedly went beyond the information gathering most social media monitoring tools employ. The Daily Dot reported that Geofeedia actively worked with law enforcement to get around the privacy of Facebook and other social networks, including setting up fake accounts to gather intel. If that is true, Geofeedia’s activity was a violation of Facebook’s terms of service. Engaging in practices that go against a social network’s terms of service may seem attractive in the short run but usually have negative consequences in the long run.

This move of cutting off social media surveillance services that are directly providing services to law enforcement goes beyond Geofeedia, though. Twitter also recently revoked Snaptrends’ access to its data.

Looking at the bigger picture, let me make one thing clear:  The decision by social networks to cut off the access of services such as Geofeedia and Snaptrends will not stop law enforcement and government agencies from using social media monitoring to track people’s activity. There are many services that provide similar functionality whose ability to pull data from the major social networks remains intact. And even if all of those services get cut off from the data of the major social networks, most social networks have built-in search functionality that any user can access to search for information. As long as that is the case, some form of social media monitoring by law enforcement (even rudimentary monitoring) will always be possible.

The real crux of this situation boils down to three main points:

1. The major social networks do not want to appear complicit in helping law enforcement track activists and protestors. An active user base provides a trove of information that social networks can leverage to draw advertisers. If users become unhappy with a social network and migrate away from it, that social network’s capacity to generate revenue will decline. As a result, all social networks want to project the perception that they are protecting the privacy of their users. In reality, these social networking giants realize social media monitoring by law enforcement agencies will continue regardless of whether Geofeedia and similar services survive. Remember, Facebook was a Geofeedia customer. It’s difficult to believe they didn’t know or at least assume law enforcement was using the service to access its data. Facebook only reacted when Geofeedia’s relationship with law enforcement became the source of public debate.

2. Never assume any level of privacy online. None. Anything you post online could be viewed, accessed and disseminated to third parties. A good rule of thumb is this: If you wouldn’t want something to appear on the front page of a national newspaper, do not publish it online. If you post content online that reflects poorly on you or your employer, the chances are good that it will come back to bite you.

3. While social media monitoring by government agencies can raise privacy concerns, it is also often used by these agencies as a tool to assist the public in times of need. In the statement it released in response to this situation, Geofeedia cited that its services were used “in response and recovery efforts – from the Boston Marathon to the effects of Hurricane Matthew…to assist millions of people affected by both manmade and natural events.” In this way, government agencies use social media monitoring as a lifesaving tool.

It will be interesting to see where this situation goes from here. It is relevant to point out that Twitter said it was “suspending” Geofeedia’s access, not “terminating” it. That word choice is important. It sounds as if the door is open for Twitter to reinstate that access if the current controversy dies down and Geofeedia changes some of its practices.

Either way, realize that your online activity is being tracked, and that fact will not change any time soon.

Scott Juba has been successfully negotiating the social media and digital landscape for years. He is the president of Radar Public Relations & Consulting and serves of counsel to Hennes Communications.