Facebook Scans To Help Alert Police Of Criminal Activities
According to a Reuters report Facebook is scanning updates and chat logs for suspicious activity. The report goes on to say that when suspicious activity was found police could be notified if Facebook believed what was being said was serious enough. The technology scans chat logs and messages for certain keywords and phrases that may indicate that the person is involved with criminal activity or at risk of being taken advantage of by criminals. Facebook said that they don’t want to monitor people’s private conversations which is why they say they try and have a very low false positive rate. That is they try and avoid viewing conversations which should not be viewed.
Facebook does not see any private communication until it is flagged as possibly being criminal. It is only then that Facebook view the information to see if needs be reported to police. Some analysts have said they found the news surprising and didn’t think Facebook would actually monitor private conversations. Under law communication providers such as Facebook aren’t legally accountable for illegal activities which take place using their medium of communication.
Civil libertarians have attacked the policy saying that it infringes on the basic right to privacy of its users. They say that monitoring people’s private chats is not only morally wrong but an ineffective way to tackle online crime. They say that the number of conversations which must be viewed accidentally by Facebook staff infringe upon the rights of those who have done nothing wrong and that it is unlikely that real criminals would be silly enough to talk about their criminal activities on Facebook. They particularly raise concerns over the policy which flagged as criminal conversations with heavy swearing saying that individuals should have the right to speak however they wish in private without worrying that Facebook might be listening in.
They also argued that the mere fact the conversations are being recorded could lead to privacy abuses in the future if not by Facebook than by hackers or even the government. One civil libertarian even argued that Facebook’s policy was the equivalent of the US Postal Service photo copying every letter they received.
Facebook however have defended the policy saying it’s vital that they are able to prevent their network being used as a means for criminals to conduct their activities. They also point out the need to protect children who use their network from predators and other criminals who might seek to take advantage.
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