US Homeland Security will use Companies to discover Extremism on Social Media

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US Department of Homeland Security will not depend solely on in-house systems to spot extremist threats on social media. The Wall Street Journal reported that the intelligence officer and initiative leader John Cohen issued a press statement. He said Homeland Security is looking at hiring companies to analyze social networks for signs of impending terrorism and other extremist violence. Cohen said the department had been studying social media before, but the outside partners would help dramatically expand these efforts. Point to be noted that murmurs of extensive social media scanning first surfaced in May, but there were few details about how it would work.

The rumors also suggested that Homeland Security would focus on alarming trends instead of individual targets, such as brewing extremist movements or threats against specific communities. The major objective is to catch the violent rhetoric behind events like the January 6th Capitol riot, which Homeland Security didn’t anticipate despite mounting social media activity. One of the companies involved in discussions is (Logically) a firm that uses a mix of AI and human analysis to track online content at a large scale. It was formerly involved in a government effort to fight voting misinformation, but here could use publicly accessible social media to spot trouble.

It is still unconfirmed whether or not Homeland Security will address privacy fears. Cohen also said the department wouldn’t use companies to acquire the information it was restricted from seeing. The WSJ said that officials were determined to protect civil liberties. Logically chief Lyric Jain said his company couldn’t share personal data for Americans without court orders. However, there are concerns Homeland Security could abuse this private analysis. It could theoretically hold on to content and use the data to pursue unrelated criminal cases or target peaceful political dissent. It could chill free speech by making people afraid to talk about certain subjects on public channels.