[Lnc-business] Govt. now asking travelers for social media accounts – good subject for an LP press release

[Starchild]

	According to the article copied below, the program in which travelers are being asked to "voluntarily" provide their social media information has been active less than a week, and this is the first I've heard about it, so it seems like a timely subject for us to address. If staff or the chair decide to do a release on it, I think a good angle in addition to echoing some of the points made by civil liberties advocates quoted in the Common Dreams article would be to draw attention to government's own secrecy, and call for top officials to fill out and release to the media these same forms they're asking travelers to fill out. You're welcome to use the following quote from me:

Starchild, an elected representative on the Libertarian National Committee, said the government needs to focus more energy on being transparent itself and less on spying on the rest of us. "Uncle Sam is like a manipulative person you meet online who wants to know everything about you but won't tell you any of his own sensitive information." According to cyber-security reporter Christopher Burgess, "Every year United States government agencies add petabytes of classified information (a petabyte equals 20 million four drawer filing cabinets." (https://news.clearancejobs.com/2013/06/12/the-biggest-problem-in-the-u-s-government-classification-system-today/)

	Another good angle could be describing the program's introduction as an unwelcome "Christmas present" to travelers, or making an unfavorable comparison to Santa. Here's another quote from me you can use:

"Knowing who among us is 'bad' or 'good' may be okay when it comes to Santa Claus, but if Santa screws up, the worst that's going to happen is you don't get what you want for Christmas. Santa's elves aren't using what they know to target people in drone strikes, throw them in prison for unconstitutional 'crimes', or break into their homes armed in riot gear and carrying automatic weapons."

Love & Liberty,
                                   ((( starchild )))
At-Large Representative, Libertarian National Committee
                                (415) 625-FREE
                                  @StarchildSF


>> Begin forwarded message:
>> 
>> From: "Michael Eisenscher" <meisenscher at gmail.com>
>> To: "UFPJ Activist List" <ufpj-activist at lists.mayfirst.org>
>> Date: December 23, 2016 at 8:05:38 PM PST
>> Subject: [ufpj-activist] US Government Quietly Starts Asking Travelers for Social Media Accounts
>> Reply-To: Michael Eisenscher <meisenscher at gmail.com>
>> 
>> 
>> Friday, December 23, 2016
>> by Common Dreams
>> US Government Quietly Starts Asking Travelers for Social Media Accounts
>> 
>> Controversial program met with opposition from civil liberties groups when first proposed in June
>> 
>> by Nadia Prupis, staff writer
>> http://uslaboragainstwar.org/Article/76965/us-government-quietly-starts-asking-travelers-for-social-media-accounts
>>  
>> 
>> Social media accounts are "gateways into an enormous amount of [users'] online expression and associations, which can reflect highly sensitive information about that person's opinions, beliefs, identity, and community." (Photo: The Hamster Factor/flickr/cc)
>> 
>> The U.S. government has quietly started to ask foreign travelers to hand over their social media accounts upon arriving in the country, a program that aims to spot potential terrorist threats but which civil liberties advocates have long opposed as a threat to privacy.
>> 
>> The program has been active since Tuesday, asking travelers arriving to the U.S. on visa waivers to voluntarily enter information associated with their online presence, including "Facebook, Google+, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube, as well as a space for users to input their account names on those sites," Politico reports.
>> 
>> The U.S. Department of Homeland Security first proposed the idea in June, when it was met with opposition and criticism from rights groups, consumer advocates, and other entities, including the Internet Association, which represents Facebook, Google, and Twitter.
>> 
>> At the time, a coalition of groups including the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the Center for American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), and the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT), among others, sent a letter to the government warning that many travelers would feel obligated to give their information to border agents and that the program would "fall hardest on Arab and Muslim communities, whose usernames, posts, contacts, and social networks will be exposed to intense scrutiny."
>> 
>> Social media accounts are "gateways into an enormous amount of [users'] online expression and associations, which can reflect highly sensitive information about that person's opinions, beliefs, identity, and community," the letter stated.
>> 
>> But it appears the Obama administration ignored their warnings about the threat to privacy and free expression and finalized the program anyway.
>> 
>> "There are very few rules about how that information is being collected, maintained [and] disseminated to other agencies, and there are no guidelines about limiting the government’s use of that information," Michael W. Macleod-Ball, chief of staff for the ACLU's Washington office, told Politico's Tony Romm. "While the government certainly has a right to collect some information ... it would be nice if they would focus on the privacy concerns some advocacy groups have long expressed."
>> 
>> The "optional" question is part of the Electronic System for Travel Authorization (ESTA), which visitors on the visa waiver program are required to complete in order to enter the country. The program allows certain travelers to be in the U.S. for up to 90 days without a visa.
>> 
>> Nathan White, senior legislative manager of Access Now, said the program constituted a threat to human rights.
>> 
>> "The choice to hand over this information is technically voluntary," he told Ramm. "But the process to enter the U.S. is confusing, and it's likely that most visitors will fill out the card completely rather than risk additional questions from intimidating, uniformed officers—the same officers who will decide which of your jokes are funny and which ones make you a security risk."
>> 
>> This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License
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