Digital Content

Social media has become an integral part of everyday life for individuals around the world. In light of the growing role of online communication, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) implemented a notable change to its collection and record-keeping of social media information and search results of non-US persons (naturalized citizens, green card holders, immigrant visa holders, asylees, special immigrant juveniles, and student visa holders) in the United States. Per a notice issued in September, the information will be stored in DHS’ visa and immigration history records for each individual, also known as “Alien Files” or “A-Files.” Given the serious threats to freedom of association and privacy posed by this practice, OTI has signed onto a coalition letter expressing concern regarding DHS practices around social media collection and retention.

A coalition of right-leaning groups is pressing Congress to act on legislation that would create a new legal framework that allows law enforcement to access US electronic communications held on servers abroad. The bipartisan bill, called the International Communications Privacy Act (ICPA), has been introduced by Reps Doug Collins (R-GA) and Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) in the House and Sens Orrin Hatch (R-UT), Chris Coons (D-DE), and Dean Heller (R-NV) in the Senate.

The bill seeks to clarify the process by which law enforcement obtains electronic data on US citizens for investigations, regardless of the location of the communications. It would require law enforcement agencies to obtain a warrant for all content. It would also allow law enforcement to, in certain circumstances, obtain electronic communications on foreign nationals. On Oct 25, right-leaning organizations including Americans for Tax Reform and the R Street Institute wrote to leaders of the House and Senate Judiciary Committees pressing them to swiftly consider the bill.

[Commentary] Kenyans go to the polls for the second time Oct 26 to stage a redo of the country’s presidential election in August. In the months leading up to the initial vote, Kenyans faced a barrage of misleading information through print, TV, radio, and social media. The atmosphere, fraught with memories of violence during 2007 presidential election, peaked with the torture and murder of an election official just days before the polls opened.

Days before the August election, Facebook rolled out an educational tool to help Kenyan users spot fake news: quick tips for spotting fake news, such as, “be skeptical of headlines” or “some stories are intentionally false.” Facebook is an important information channel in Kenya, reaching six million people, out of an estimated 37.7 million internet users, and Kenyans desperately needed the critical-thinking skills to better navigate misinformation. But the platform’s last-minute tool paled in comparison with the long and contentious election run-up.

[Bebe Santa-Wood is a recent graduate of Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs, specializing in Human Rights and Communications. Tara Susman-Peña is senior technical advisor in the Center for Applied Learning & Impact (CALI) and the Information & Media practice at IREX.]

[Commentary] Handing the network neutrality problem over to a government agency with strong industry ties and poor mechanisms for public accountability poses a real danger of creating more problems than we’d solve. One alternative is to foster a genuinely competitive market for Internet access. If subscribers and customers had adequate information about their options and could vote with their feet, internet service providers (ISPs) would have strong incentives to treat all network traffic fairly. But the ISP market today is under oligopoly control. Nearly one in three American households have no choice when it comes to their Internet, and for all the other consumers choices are quite limited.

Another scenario would be for Congress to step in and pass net neutrality legislation that outlines what the ISPs are not allowed to do. But fighting giant ISP mega-corporations (and their army of lobbyists) in Congress promises to be a tough battle. Yet another option: empower subscribers to not just test their ISP, but challenge it in court if they detect harmful non-neutral practices. That gives all of us the chance to be watchdogs of the public interest, but it too, is likely to face powerful ISP opposition.

[John Ottman is Chairman and co-founder of Minds, Inc. a social media network.]

Sen Lindsey Graham (R-SC) said that he is talking with Google, Facebook, and Twitter about testifying before the Judiciary Committee about Russia's social media manipulation on Oct 31, a day before the tech giants arrive for long-anticipated intelligence committee hearings on both sides of the Capitol. "Google's all good [to appear, and] we're working with the others" to testify before the Judiciary subpanel on crime and terrorism next week, Sen Graham said. "It's really important. We need to do this."

The Content Creators Coalition (c3), which advocates on behalf of musicians, is launching an ad campaign against YouTube and its parent company Google, accusing them of exploiting artists. The group unveiled a pair of video ads on Oct 25 that call out YouTube for undermining musicians’ control over their content and cutting into their ad revenue streams.

“Google’s YouTube has shortchanged artists while earning billions of dollars off our music,” said Melvin Gibbs, an accomplished bassist and the president of c3. “Artists know YouTube can do better. So, rather than hiding behind outdated laws, YouTube and Google should work to give artists more control over our music and pay music creators fairly when our songs are played on their platform.” The group wants Congress to update the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), which it believes places too much of a burden on content creators to police the internet for copyright infringements while letting internet platforms off the hook.

Facebook has been criticised for the worrying impact on democracy of its “downright Orwellian” decision to run an experiment seeing professional media removed from the main news feed in six countries. The experiment, which began 19 Oct and is still ongoing, involves limiting the core element of Facebook’s social network to only personal posts and paid adverts. So-called public posts, such as those from media organisation Facebook pages, are being moved to a separate “explore” feed timeline. As a result, media organisations in the six countries containing 1% of the world’s population – Sri Lanka, Guatemala, Bolivia, Cambodia, Serbia and Slovakia – have had one of their most important publishing platforms removed overnight.

“The Facebook explore tab killed 66% of our traffic. Just destroyed it … years of really hard work were just swept away,” says Dina Fernandez, a journalist and member of the editorial board at Guatemalan news site Soy502. “It has been catastrophic, and I am very, very worried.” For those who rely on Facebook to campaign politically, share breaking news, or keep up to date with the world, that might be a concerning thought. “I’m worried about the impact of Facebook on democracy,” said Fernandez. “One company in particular has a gigantic control on the flow of information worldwide. This alone should be worrisome. It’s downright Orwellian.”

Twitter has been lambasted by lawmakers for not doing enough to stop bots and anonymous ads from spreading propaganda and misinformation on its platform.

On Oct 24, Twitter announced it will launch what it’s calling an Advertising Transparency Center that will disclose for the first time a list of all ads running on Twitter to all users, details on how long each ad has been running for, other campaigns associated with any given ad, and which ads are being targeted at you. The disclosures go even further for political advertising, requiring the disclosure of who is paying for an ad, who it’s targeted toward, and historical data about electioneering ad spending by the advertiser. The move comes as pressure is growing from Washington to police social media companies such as Twitter and Facebook.

Republicans and the advertising industry at a hearing Oct 24 criticized proposals to expand disclosure rules on online political ads amid revelations Russian actors used social media platforms to influence the 2016 election.

Randall Rothenberg, president and CEO of the Interactive Advertising Bureau, told lawmakers on the House Oversight and Government Reform Subcommittee on Information Technology that new rules would unduly burden digital publishers. “One of the problems I have with the Honest Ads Act is its placing the burden on smaller publishers that don’t have the financial wherewithal to shoulder that burden,” he said, referring to legislation offered in the Senate that would impose new regulations on web companies. Rep Paul Mitchell (R-MI) blasted the idea of holding companies like Facebook and Google to the same rules as other media over political ads. “On the internet post, the provider, the intermediary is not responsible for it. They didn’t write it. They didn’t hire them, they didn’t determine who they are, yet you want to hold them to the same standard as your newspaper, which is an entirely different format,” he said. Rep Mitchell said new rules would infringe on free speech.

The Justice Department has backed the challenge top a college speech policy that allegedly confined that speech to a 616-square-foot "free Speech Area" and has "unpublished" rules governing speech that student's aren't apprised of unless they apply for a permit. That came in a "statement of interest" in which Justice said Kevin Shaw, who sued Los Angeles Pierce College over the policy, had adequately made his case that his First Amendment rights have been violated--he said he had been prevented from distributing a copy of the Constitution in Spanish outside of that safe zone. Justice says the college policy is an "unconstitutional prior restraint that chilled free expression, and that they did not constitute valid time, place, and manner restrictions."

“University officials and faculty must defend free expression boldly and unequivocally," said Attorney General Jeff Sessions. "Last month, I promised a recommitment to free speech on campus and to ensuring First Amendment rights. The Justice Department continues to do its part in defending free speech, protecting students’ free expression, and enforcing federal law.”