US Department of Homeland Security to Collect Social Media information from Immigrants Starting Oct 18th
The US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) plans to start collecting social media information on all immigrants in the US, including permanent residents and naturalized citizens starting October 18th.
In a document published on the Federal Register last week, DHS plans to collect “social media handles, aliases, associated identifiable information, and search results”. The information will be permanently stored on individuals’ immigration files beginning October 18th.
DHS also plans to collect information on immigrants “from the internet, public records, public institutions, interviews, commercial data providers, and information shared obtained through information sharing agreements.”
DHS earlier this year also floated the idea of collecting social media and phone passwords from some immigrants entering the United States in what it said was an effort to tighten security at the nation’s borders.
Critics of the new plan say the move is disturbing, may violate individuals’ free speech, and may not make the nation any more secure. "We see this as part of a larger process of high tech surveillance of immigrants and more and more people being subjected to social media screening. There's a growing trend at the Department of Homeland Security to be snooping on the social media of immigrants and foreigners and we think it's an invasion of privacy and deters freedom of speech," Adam Schwartz, an attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation tells BuzzFeed News.
Schwartz also says US citizens who communicate with immigrants will also be affected by the program, and might have their private information and communications shared with the government.
Critics also say the information gathered from Facebook, Instagram and other social media platforms may be used to by the government to deny individuals entry into the United States, even when such information is inaccurate or individuals’ accounts have been hacked. “There is also the possibility that someone may be hacked and will be held to task for a post or comment,” García Hernández, assistant professor at the University of Denver Sturm College of Law tells BuzzFeed News.
Comments (3)
This is probably fake news. Under US Constitution The Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution provides that the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized. Naturalized Citizens have same rights as US born Citizen with exception that they cannot become President of the United States. The US Constitution has to be changed to allow such arbitrarily searches of Naturalized Citizens
DHS has been and will continue to collect social media content of all immigrants and anyone they communicate with. This is simply a fact of life. It is very true and can easily be verified.
True mumbi even here in Kenya they do listen to pples phones so this is not news.All over the world governments do check,hack,listens to pples communication especially due to terrorism.To me the gover should do so aslong as they don't hack on pples accounts