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EFFecting Change: Protect the Vote on October 8

Related Content: Social media surveillance

Related Content: Social media surveillance

Surveillance cameras peering around, each with a social media company icon.
Deeplinks Blog by Saira Hussain, Sophia Cope | November 25, 2019

DEEP DIVE: EFF to DHS: Stop Mass Collection of Social Media Information

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) recently released a proposed rule expanding the agency’s collection of social media information on key visa forms and immigration applications. Earlier this month, EFF joined over 40 civil society organizations that signed on to comments drafted by the Brennan Center for Justice....

Deeplinks Blog by Saira Hussain, Sophia Cope | August 30, 2019

Harvard Student’s Deportation Raises Concerns About Border Device Searches and Social Media Surveillance

Media outlets reported this week that an international student at Harvard University was deported back to Lebanon after border agents in Boston searched his electronic devices and confronted him about his friends’ social media posts. These allegations raise serious concerns about whether the government is following its own policies regarding...
Deeplinks Blog by Saira Hussain, Sophia Cope | August 5, 2019

DEEP DIVE: CBP’s Social Media Surveillance Poses Risks to Free Speech and Privacy Rights

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and one of its component agencies, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), released a Privacy Impact Assessment [.pdf] on CBP’s practice of monitoring social media to enhance the agency’s “situational awareness.” As we’ve argued in relation to other government social media surveillance...

Deeplinks Blog by Sophia Cope, Adam Schwartz | February 15, 2019

EFF to State Department: Respect Freedom of Speech of Chinese Students

EFF joined a letter to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo opposing a proposal to deploy stronger vetting procedures against Chinese students intending to study in the United States because the procedures would threaten the free speech interests of both Chinese students and their American associates.Reuters reported that the...

Deeplinks Blog by David Ruiz | May 30, 2018

EFF and Other Groups Fight State Department Collection of Social Media Information … Again

EFF and 54 civil liberties organizations joined comments this week written by the Brennan Center for Justice and the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) standing up against the U.S. government’s plans to collect social media information from foreigners entering the United States. This is the fifth time we’ve fought this...

Deeplinks Blog by Sophia Cope | April 3, 2018

State Dept. Wants to Expand Social Media Collection to All Visa Applicants

The State Department has alarmingly declared that it wants to collect social media information from all visa applicants. This appears to be an expansion of a 2017 program that sought social media information only from a subset of initially suspicious visa applicants. This is also the latest effort in a...

thinking robot icon over a grid of colorful hexagons
Deeplinks Blog by Aleksander "Sasha" Danielyan | November 16, 2017

EFF Urges DHS to Abandon Social Media Surveillance and Automated “Extreme Vetting” of Immigrants

EFF is urging the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to end its programs of social media surveillance and automated “extreme vetting” of immigrants. Together, these programs have created a privacy-invading integrated system to harvest, preserve, and data-mine immigrants' social media information, including use of algorithms that sift through posts using...

Security Education
Deeplinks Blog by Sophia Cope, Adam Schwartz | October 3, 2017

DHS Should Stop the Social Media Surveillance of Immigrants

UPDATE: EFF joined coalition comments on October 18, 2017 in opposition to the A-File notice.The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) last month issued a notice that it is storing social media information on immigrants, including lawful permanent residents and naturalized U.S. citizens, apparently indefinitely, in a government...

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