Big Brother on Facebook
Thats right, big brother on Facebook may be watching you. While its long been known that the government monitors the internet to protect us from terrorist attacks or looming natural disasters, it has just been officially revealed the Department of Homeland Security paid a contractor back in 2009 to monitor sites like Facebook, blogs, and user responses to articles, as reported by the New York Times in their recent article about big brother on Facebook.
Big Brother on Facebook | Spy Games
So you might be asking yourself, why is big brother on Facebook? Well back in 2009 many prisoners were being transported from Guantanamo Bay, Cuba to prisons in the United States, so chances are they weren’t spying in your neighborhood. However big brother on Facebook was confirmed in the small town of Standish Michigan.
…to see how the residents of Standish, Mich., were reacting to a proposal to move detainees from Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, to a local prison there, according to newly disclosed documents.
So basically if citizens want to monitor the government as the case with WikiLeaks then justice will be served, but if the government wants to see opinions of those in Standish, MI over new criminals being shipped into town, thats perfectly fine.
As mentioned earlier most already knew that the government does in fact monitor the web for threats of terror, however this recent discovery shows that the government is spying on its citizens’ opinions on government proposals dealing with homeland security.
A department official said Friday that the social network monitoring program did not produce reports about public opinion, but instead focused exclusively on monitoring crises like hazardous material spills, shooting incidents and natural disasters.
Still, the newly disclosed documents show that in August 2009, during an early test of the program, a contractor compiled reactions among residents of Standish, Mich., to the short-lived detainee proposal. It found that most people “were opposed to the plan,” arguing it could make the community a terrorist target, but that others characterized these concerns as “hysteria.”
Big Brother on Facebook | Free Speech?
There are a lot of folks out there concerned about free speech after reading about big brother on Facebook. Its understandable too, because this monitoring program was very extensive, it produced a 300 page report overviewing all of its findings.
Ginger McCall, director of the group’s Open Government Program, said it was appropriate for the department to use the Internet to search for emerging threats to public safety. But, she said, monitoring what people are saying about government policies went too far and could chill free speech.
“The Department of Homeland Security’s monitoring of political dissent has no legal basis and is contrary to core First Amendment principles,” she said.
She also pointed out that while other sample reports in the February 2010 handbook discuss content that is inappropriate and should be removed, the Standish one does not. “This Standish report is being held up, as is, as an example that should be emulated,” she said.
In the government’s defense the names in the 300 page report were not very specific. If the report recorded a web user’s comments their simply marked as “Twitter user” instead of the specific name of the Twitter user that was quoted. However the blog names and news sources were cited by name.
Big Brother on Facebook | Your Thoughts?
So do you feel that big brother on Facebook infringes on our freedom of speech or is it justified, let us know!
Image attribution: http://1-minute.fr/facebook-vs-big-brother/