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Open Gov't Advocates Fear that Private Messaging Apps Are Being Misused by Public Officials To Conduct Business in Secret (pbs.org)
The proliferation of digital tools that make text and email messages vanish may be welcome to Americans seeking to guard their privacy. But open government advocates fear they are being misused by public officials to conduct business in secret and evade transparency laws. From a report: Whether communications on those platforms should be part of the public record is a growing but unsettled debate in states across the country. Updates to transparency laws lag behind rapid technological advances, and the public and private personas of state officials overlap on private smartphones and social media accounts. "Those kind of technologies literally undermine, through the technology itself, state open government laws and policies," said Daniel Bevarly, executive director of the National Freedom of Information Coalition. "And they come on top of the misuse of other technologies, like people using their own private email and cellphones to conduct business." Some government officials have argued that public employees should be free to communicate on private, non-governmental cellphones and social media platforms without triggering open records requirements.
We have the government saying encryption is thwarting their efforts to gather information on people, while at the same time (some) government folks are saying it's perfectly reasonable for them to use apps which thwart the public's effort to gather information on them.
Yes, because government is accountable to the people, not the other way around.
"Wait. Something's happening. It's opening up! My God, it's full of apricots!"
But open government advocates fear they are being misused by public officials to conduct business in secret and evade transparency laws.
Before the digital age, the government employees would have meetings in person and just not write down what was said. That doesn't make restaurants and bars somehow complicit or instrumental in government officials' malfeasance.
Face it, there is generally a de facto expectation that private meetings and discussions in person are not automatically subject to transparency requirements. I mean, should a government official be required to record every single meal they have and with whom and what, if anything, was discussed?
Granted, there is a blurring of the lines with things like Twitter. Everyone wondered whether President Obama would blur that line, though he did a very good job separating himself from his personal social media presence once he became president. On the other hand, President Trump has not done the same and Hillary Clinton most definitely acted wrongly with her private email setup (she was not the only, but by far the most willful and egregious example). In any event, the discussion needs to be had because of the nature of social media and other technological means of communication.
No, this is wanting governments to follow the laws they passed. Open government laws require that records are kept and trying to get around that is illegal.
What we need are stronger punishments for this activity as we already have decided that these acts are against the law.
Sorry, teleporters just kill you and then make a copy. A perfect, soul-less copy.
Exactly, the US government is expressly empowered by the people to act for the people, in specific ways. We don't have the Divine Right of Kings here.
The Constitution explicitly delegates certain specific powers to the federal government, and reserves all other powers to the states and the people. Powers are preserved with the people because that's where they come from. Washington politicians work for us, at our pleasure not the other way around.
Fear that it is being abused? Hasn't it been uncovered already?