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DC Inauguration Protestors Are Being Hit With Facebook Data Searches (citylab.com)
During the protests over the inauguration of Donald Trump, more than 230 protestors were arrested -- many of which were charged with rioting and had their phones seized by Washington, D.C., police. One of the individuals who was arrested received an email from Facebook's "Law Enforcement Response Team," which raises the question: Did D.C. police ask Facebook to reveal information about this arrestee? CityLab reports: In an emailed response to CityLab's request for more information, Rachel Reid, a spokesperson for the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department, responded that "MPD does not comment on investigative tactics." The District of Columbia United States Attorney's Office -- the agency leading the prosecution of Inauguration protesters -- has not yet responded to CityLab's inquiry. CityLab also asked Facebook about the email. "We don't comment on individual requests," company spokesperson Jay Nancarrow said. He referred CityLab to the site's law enforcement guidelines page and to its Government Requests Report database, where the public can see how many legal processes it receives from countries worldwide. According to this database, U.S. law enforcement requested information on the accounts of 38,951 users over January to June of 2016, and they received some type of data in 80 percent of cases. Which "legal process" authorities sent to Facebook for information on the protester matters considerably in terms of how much data they can seize for investigation. According to Facebook's legal guidelines, a search warrant, for example, could allow Facebook to give away content data including "messages, photos, videos, timeline posts, and location information." A subpoena or a court order would give authorities less information, but would still include the individual's "name, length of service, credit card information, email address(es), and a recent login/logout IP address(es)."
it raises the question but does not beg.
protesting is illegal.
No, but rioting is. You know - burning cars, hurting people, damaging property. Just like it was under Obama and every other president we've had. Protesting and rioting are not the same thing, obviously.
Protest Definition != Riot Definition
If every single marketing drone in corporate America with the right subscription can mine all this data to sell us useless plastic trinkets that we don't need, then why not let the police mine it to solve crimes that were committed during a large public gathering?
No one is saying they are going after the innocent granny holding a "i would have rather had Hillary" placard but if she happened to share a photo of some anarchists destroying property that can help the police identify them, then hell yes the police should be searching it so long as they had probable cause and got a warrant.