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Surveillance Firm 'Geofeedia' Cuts Half of Staff After Losing Access To Twitter, Facebook (chicagotribune.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the cause-and-effect dept.

In mid-October, an American Civil Liberties Union issued a report accusing police of using Geofeedia -- a CIA-backed social-media monitoring platform -- to track protests and other large gatherings. As a result, Instagram, Facebook and eventually, Twitter cut the company off from its valuable data stream, causing them to cut half of their staff to "focus on a variety of innovations" that will allow them to serve their customers and continue their "rapid growth trajectory as a leading real-time analytics and alerting platform." Chicago Tribune reports: Geofeedia cut the jobs, mostly in sales in the Chicago office, in the third week of October, the spokesman said. It has offices in Chicago, Indianapolis and Naples, Fla. The cuts were first reported by Crain's Chicago Business. An emailed statement attributed to CEO Phil Harris said Geofeedia wasn't "created to impact civil liberties," but in the wake of the public debate over their product, they're changing the company's direction. Harris said Geofeedia's software has been "impactful" for schools, sports leagues, customer service, marketing and event planning, per the statement. He also referred to the company's $17 million funding round in February -- which brought its total funding to nearly $24 million -- and "strong sales and growth" as strengthening the company. "Our strong financial position has allowed us to carefully consider the appropriate areas of focus for our technology going forward," Harris wrote in the statement.

9 of 31 comments (clear)

  1. Civil Liberties by ConnerT · · Score: 3, Insightful

    What Civil Liberties...

    1. Re:Civil Liberties by rtb61 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Fuck worrying about civil liberties, these guys surveil for profit, produce nothing actionable and they'll be dropped, so they will fabricate by selectively shifting data from one source to another, deleting contrary data and straight up fabricating data. Their profits have to be based upon it. Nothing to report, they go bankrupt, something to report (tough luck for their victims) and the profits roll in. Exactly the kind of people who were used to create 'Anonymous', it can be fun but those ass hats are extremely dangerous and will fabricate all kinds of lies as truth in order to fabricate profits. It is insane to put that kind of power in contractors who have a built in profit motive to lie. Stupid enough to do that and they will be manipulated into serving other people's purposes.

      --
      Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
  2. CIA smoke screens. by geekmux · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Geofeedia wasn't "created to impact civil liberties,"

    Yes, I'm sure you had the CIA as one of your primary customers in order for them to ensure their Christmas card distribution list was accurate. Let's keep pretending they just sell donuts for the government or some shit...

  3. This is bullshit ... by CaptainDork · · Score: 2, Interesting

    ... because those of us who dabble in this space have been banned too many times to count.

    We just put on a hoodie, grab a freemail and get back into the game.

    Those guys are still grabbing data and selling it.

    --
    It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
  4. Geofeedia 2.0 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Multiple, apparently respectable, companies, each with their own data feeds from twitter, facebook, etc. Sharing all the data with another company that does the actual spying.

    This then via highly complex technical; and legal constructs, so that the source of the 'leak' cannot be traced. Possibly even all legal, and technically not violating any agreement they may have with Twitter, Facebook, etc., but certainly setup in such a way that, if the shit does hit the fan, nobody can be held accountable.

    You know this will happen. Likely it is already happening.

  5. The real story ... by CaptainDork · · Score: 2

    ... is: "..a CIA-backed social-media monitoring platform.."

    --
    It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
    1. Re:The real story ... by elrous0 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I pretty much just assume that any company these days with an office or HQ in northern Virginia, Maryland, or DC is a CIA front company. Shit, they're one of the biggest industries in those states.

      --
      SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
    2. Re:The real story ... by AHuxley · · Score: 2

      Re " they're one of the biggest industries in those states.".
      The growth is in tools the CIA needs to track digital cover stories for its future staff. Other nations, detective agencies, brands that do background work on staff, all have the same web 2.0 info and look at all US staff, workers, tourists, NGO's.
      The big fear is that undercover CIA is going to have one image, photo that was not found in time that shows their true origins, politics and interest in serving the US gov.
      Their created cover as a random NGO worker, person of faith, cult member, trust fund tourist, below average company worker, average new embassy worker is then exposed. An average student gets a US gov job is what the resume said, the photo shows a much smarter student at different US university taking advanced language, political courses.
      If such info exists in the private sector that new CIA worker cant do much globally as their true background and really great academic ability is so very public.
      The other issue is that of deep cover complex legends covering brands, cults, faith groups, groups of tech people, staff working undercover "together". All timelines have to fit a CIA created cover story. A party picture found a decade later on some private database can undo years of CIA creativity.
      The CIA can request to alter the web 2.0 and any easy to find US online archive. But what did a 3rd party store in real time a decade ago? The CIA needs that same live feed to look back over all applicants and see what any other smart nation will be able to find or buy on the open market.
      Creating a fake past was state paper work and a few US federal computer database alterations easy until the 1980's. Facial recognition will now find that old university picture on early social media and web 2.0. The right person at another university, different friends, very different degree, different politics.
      The CIA now has to hire real NGO workers, persons of faith, cult members, trust fund tourists, below average company workers, average new embassy workers but such people on average often create stories or don't make great workers. Or hope they found every digital trace of their smart worker.
      Or hope that a smart new staff undercover really kept away from all parties, functions, clubs, had no friends with an early digital camera archive to put online a decade later and only had state and student ID for a few years at university...

      --
      Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
  6. Nice to see Chicago PD... by skr95062 · · Score: 3, Informative

    Being the patented dicks that they are. When asked if they were using this platform, instead of coming out and answering the question, they respond like the douchbags that they are with "file a FOIA request" so they can deny it and force the requester to take them to court. Why make it easy on the public they are supposed to protect and serve.