US government backs off social media monitoring

Jim Giles, consultant

Last week, as I was putting together a story about US government plans to monitor social networks, I came across some strange language in a proposal by the Department of State.

The department had asked software developers earlier this month to bid on a contract to build a system for collecting and analysing social media conversations - think Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, blogs - of interest to the government. The plan was to use the information to better understand what people are saying about the US, and perhaps to head off groups who might pose a threat.

The part that jumped out at me was a clause buried in the supporting information. It stated that developers should make "a reasonable effort to exclude Americans from any and all analyses". It would probably be impossible to avoid collecting information on US citizens, since it is not exactly common practice to attach citizenship information to a tweet or forum comment. So why would the Department of State include such an onerous restriction in the solicitation?

When I asked for clarification, the department missed one deadline and then a second. Then, on 14 June, they withdrew the solicitation. They won't explain why, other than saying that the request had not been "properly vetted" and has been cancelled pending "further review" (the original solicitation is still online).

I don't know for sure what happened, but here's my guess: the Department of State isn't 100 per cent sure whether it can legally collect information on US citizens. Such activities are governed in part by the Privacy Act, which states that federal agencies cannot maintain records relating to rights guaranteed by the First Amendment. In other words: citizens have the right to complain about governments and religion and many other things, and the department should not record them doing so.

This is only a hunch, in part because the law gets more complicated after this point. Anita Allen, an expert in privacy law at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, notes that the Privacy Act includes many exemptions. Subsequent national security laws further complicate the issue. And almost all the legislation is out of date with regards to the internet: the Privacy Act dates from 1974, and another key law, the Electronic Privacy Communications Act, was passed in 1986. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg was 2 at the time.

So it's just a guess for now. Perhaps the Department of State does have the right to monitor US citizens. It'd be great to hear from an expert who can shed some light on the issue - or even someone at the department.

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