The Intimate Social Graph October 14, 2010, 11:02 AM — For a number of years I have had a privacy concern that is just now beginning to peep into view on the Internet at large. Around 2001 I spent some time in a casual multiuser game hosted by PopCap. It featured a way that two players could chat in a private space while playing the game. The game was centrally hosted: each user's local Java applet talked with a PopCap server, so every keystroke typed in those private conversations was sent up to the server and back out to the other party's client. I wondered at the time: were those conversations being stored? The privacy of one-to-one communications in Facebook messages, LinkedIn InMail and Twitter direct messages is protected mainly under the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA). Fast-forward to 2010. Of course the privacy of social networking data is dependent on security. Users of Facebook and LinkedIn can choose which information appears on their public pages for all the world to see.
Twitter, and Reacting to DOJ's Wikileaks Court Order There's a hint of poetry in the fact that Birgitta Jónsdóttir needed only a tweet to let the world know instantly that the U.S. Department of Justice was after her Twitter records. Jónsdóttir is both a member of Althingi, Iceland's parliament, and someone who helped Wikileaks get its secretly-aquired government documents up on the web and out into the world. Late Friday, Jónsdóttir tweeted the situation: "usa government wants to know about all my tweets and more since november 1st 2009" -- and Jónsdóttir later told Wired.com's Threat Level that Twitter had informed her of that United States District Court in Alexandria, Virginia, had issued a so-called 2703 (d) order [pdf], named for the relevant part of Section 18 of U.S. Code, "a couple of hours ago," informing her that she had "10 days to stop it." If not, it seems, Twitter will indeed hand over the DOJ what it seeks, the specifics of which are detailed in this comprehensive post by digital security expert Chris Soghoian.
Web 2.0 Suicide Machine - Meet your Real Neighbours again! - Sign out forever! ECPA reform: Why digital due process matters Yesterday, the Senate held a hearing on proposed updates to the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, the landmark 1986 legislation that governs the protections citizens have when they communicate using the Internet or cellphones. Today, the House held a hearing on ECPA reform and the revolution in cloud computing. While the vagaries of online privacy and tech policy are far out in the geeky stratosphere, the matter before Congress should be earning more attention from citizens, media and technologists alike. “Just as the electric grid paved the way for industrial economy, cloud computing paves the way for a digital economy,” testified David Shellhuse of Rackspace. So to take it one step further: updates to the ECPA have the potential to improve the privacy protections for every connected citizen, cloud computing provider or government employee. “Advances in technology depend not just on smart engineers but on smart laws,” testified Richard Delgado of Google.
Google+ and Privacy: A Roundup July 3, 2011 at 7:04 pm By all accounts, Google has done a great job with Plus, both on privacy and on the closely related goal of better capturing real-life social nuances. [1] This article will summarize the privacy discussions I’ve had in the first few days of using the service and the news I’ve come across. The origin of Circles “Circles,” as you’re probably aware, is the big privacy-enhancing feature. But Adams defected to Facebook a few months later, which lead to speculation that it was the end of whatever plans Google may have had for the concept. Meanwhile, Facebook introduced a friend-lists feature but it was DOA. Why are circles effective? I did an informal poll to see if people are taking advantage of Circles to organize their friend groups. One obvious explanation is that Circles captures real-life boundaries, and this is what users have been waiting for all along. There are several other UI features that contribute to the success of Circles. The resharing bug
US subpoenas Twitter for accounts of two Wikileaks volunteers The U.S. Justice Department has ordered Twitter to hand over data associated with multiple user accounts, in preparation for legal action related to Wikileaks. "There are many WikiLeaks supporters listed in the US Twitter subpoena," Wikileaks stated over Twitter tonight. UPDATE, 9:01pm PT: A copy of the order is here, and a copy of the court's unsealing order is here, via Salon's Glenn Greenwald. The order was signed by federal Magistrate Judge Theresa Buchanan, in the Eastern District of Virginia. In addition to Birgitta Jonsdottir and Jacob Appelbaum reported here earlier this evening, others named include Rop Gonggrijp (whose name is misspelled), Julian Assange, Bradley Manning, and all accounts associated with Wikileaks itself. Among those targeted: Birgitta Jonsdottir, a member of Iceland's parliament who has worked with WikiLeaks and its founder Julian Assange. From Threat Level: At The Nation, Mitchell notes: Some initial questions that come to mind:
DOJ Wants to Know Who’s Rejecting Your Friend Requests In the latest turn in our Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit for records related to the government’s use of social networking websites , the Department of Justice finally agreed to release almost 100 pages of new records. These include draft search warrants and affidavits for Facebook and MySpace and several PowerPoint presentations and articles on how to use social networking sites for investigations. (For more on what we've learned from the documents so far, see our earlier blog posts here , here , here , here , here , and here .) The draft search warrants are particularly interesting because they show the full extent of data the government regularly requests on a person it’s investigating. As of December 2009, Facebook is technically limited in its ability to provide complete IP logs ( , IP logs that contain content and transactional information, in addition to login IPs). See the documents linked below for more ( ). - Facebook Warrant, Affidavit, and Usage Notes
US wants Twitter details of Wikileaks activists 8 January 2011Last updated at 18:09 Wikileaks founder Julian Assange is currently fighting extradition from the UK to Sweden The US government has subpoenaed the social networking site Twitter for personal details of people connected to Wikileaks, court documents show. The US District Court in Virginia said it wanted information including user names, addresses, connection records, telephone numbers and payment details. Those named include Wikileaks founder Julian Assange and an Icelandic MP. The US is examining possible charges against Mr Assange over the leaking of classified diplomatic cables. Reports indicate the Department of Justice may seek to indict him on charges of conspiring to steal documents with Private First Class Bradley Manning, a US Army intelligence analyst. Mr Manning is facing a court martial and up to 52 years in prison for allegedly sending Wikileaks the diplomatic cables, as well military logs about incidents in Afghanistan and Iraq and a classified military video.
DHS Monitoring Of Social Media Under Scrutiny By Lawmakers WASHINGTON -- Lawmakers looking into homeland security officials' practice of monitoring social media sites seized on a report Thursday by a civil liberties group that said taxpayers have shelled out more than $11 million to a private contractor to analyze online comments that "reflect adversely" on the federal government. In a rare show of bipartisan agreement, members of the House Homeland Security Subcommittee on Counterterrorism and Intelligence held up a report by the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) as they questioned the chief privacy officer of the Department of Homeland Security. The hearing, titled "DHS Monitoring of Social Networking and Media: Enhancing Intelligence Gathering and Ensuring Privacy," relied heavily on talking points from a recent EPIC report on nearly 3,000 pages of documents it obtained under a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit. Rep. They repeated their concerns in a letter they sent to DHS Thursday.