Standing Rock 'check in' marks turning point for activists

[Commentary] In a show of "clicktivism," more than 1.4 million people on Facebook used geolocation tagging to "check in" to the Standing Rock Indian Reservation page. The flurry of check-ins spread across Facebook after reports surfaced that the local sheriff's department in North Dakota relied on Facebook to "find out who is at [Standing Rock] in order to target them in attempts to disrupt the prayer camps." But can checking in at Standing Rock actually help? Will it really confuse police? Can anyone interfere with a crackdown on protesters by clicking a button on Facebook? Without really knowing what kind of surveillance technology the police there are relying on, it's actually impossible to know. And that's a problem that should alarm anyone concerned about First Amendment rights.