Name: EFF to Court: Social Media Users Have Privacy and Free Speech Interests in Their Public Information
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EFF to Court: Social Media Users Have Privacy and Free Speech Interests in Their Public Information

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Email updates on news, actions,and events in your area.DEEPLINKS BLOGShare ItSpecial thanks to legal intern Rachel Sommers, who was the lead author of this post.Visa applicants to the United States are required to disclose personal information including their . And as of , they are required to register their with the U.S. government. According to the State Department, approximately will be affected by this new policy each year.EFF recently filed an in , a case challenging this “Registration Requirement” under the First Amendment. The plaintiffs in the case, two U.S.-based documentary film organizations that regularly collaborate with non-U.S. filmmakers and other international partners, argue that the Registration Requirement violates the expressive and associational rights of both their non-U.S.-based and U.S.-based members and partners. After the government filed a motion to dismiss the , we filed our brief in district court in support of the plaintiffs’ opposition to dismissal.&nbsp;In our brief, we argue that the Registration Requirement invades privacy and chills free speech and association of both visa applicants and those in their social networks, including U.S. persons, despite the fact that the policy targets only publicly available information. This is amplified by the staggering number of social media users affected and the vast amounts of personal information they publicly share—both intentionally and unintentionally—on their social media accounts.Social media profiles paint alarmingly detailed pictures of their users’ personal lives. By monitoring applicants’ social media profiles, the government can obtain information that it otherwise would not have access to through the visa application process. For example, visa applicants are not required to disclose their political views. However, applicants might choose to post their beliefs on their social media profiles. Those seeking to conceal such information might still be exposed by comments and tags made by other users. And due to the complex interactions of social media networks, studies have shown that personal information about users such as can reliably be inferred even when the user doesn’t expressly share that information. Although consular officers might be instructed to ignore this information, it is not unreasonable to fear that it might influence their decisions anyway.Just as other users’ online activity can reveal information about visa applicants, so too can visa applicants’ online activity reveal information about other users, including U.S. persons. For example, if a visa applicant tags another user in a political rant or posts photographs of themselves and the other user at a political rally, government officials might correctly infer that the other user shares the applicant’s political beliefs. In fact, one demonstrated that it is possible to accurately predict personal information about those who do not use any form of social media based solely on personal information and contact lists shared by those who do. The government’s surveillance of visa applicants’ social media profiles thus facilitates the surveillance of millions—if not billions—more people.Because social media users have in their public social media profiles, government surveillance of digital content risks chilling free speech. If visa applicants know that the government can glean vast amounts of personal information about them from their profiles—or that their anonymous or pseudonymous accounts can be linked to their real-world identities—they will be inclined to engage in self-censorship. Many will likely curtail or alter their behavior online—or even disengage from social media altogether. Importantly, because of the interconnected nature of social media, these chilling effects extend to those in visa applicants’ social networks, including U.S. persons.Studies confirm these chilling effects. Citizen Lab found that 62 percent of respondents would be less likely to “speak or write about certain topics online” if they knew that the government was engaged in online surveillance. A Pew Research Center survey found that 34 percent of its respondents who were aware of the online surveillance programs revealed by Edward Snowden had taken at least one step to shield their information from the government, including using social media less often, uninstalling certain apps, and avoiding the use of certain terms in their digital communications.One might be tempted to argue that concerned applicants can simply set their accounts to private. Some users choose to share their personal information—including their names, locations, photographs, relationships, interests, and opinions—with the public writ large. But others do so unintentionally. Given the difficulties associated with navigating privacy settings within and across platforms and the fact that privacy settings often change , there is good reason to believe that many users publicly share more personal information than they think they do. Moreover, some applicants might that setting their accounts to private will negatively impact their applications. Others—especially those using social media anonymously or pseudonymously—might be loath to maximize their privacy settings because they use their platforms with the specific intention of reaching large audiences.These chilling effects are further strengthened by the broad scope of the Registration Requirement, which allows the government to continue surveilling applicants’ social media profiles once the application process is over. Personal information obtained from those profiles can also be collected and stored in government databases for decades. And that information can be shared with other domestic and foreign governmental entities, as well as current and prospective employers and other third parties. It is no wonder, then, that social media users might severely limit or change the way they use social media.—and the review and collection by the government of personal information that is clearly outside the scope of the visa application process creates unwarranted chilling effects on both visa applicants and their social media associates, including U.S. persons. We hope that the D.C. district court denies the government’s motion to dismiss the case and ultimately strikes down the Registration Requirement as unconstitutional under the First Amendment.Share ItFormer EFF intern Shashank Sirivolu contributed to this blog post. Social media users who have sued companies for deleting, demonetizing, and otherwise moderating their content have tried several arguments that this violates their constitutional rights. Courts have consistently ruled against them because social media platforms themselves have the First Amendment...In a new round of talks this week to formulate a , EFF is calling for strictly limiting the scope of the convention’s international cooperation provisions and safeguards to ensure that states respect human rights when responding to legal assistance requests.EFF is among a group of ...Since the U.S. Supreme Court overruled a half century of precedent supporting the constitutional right to abortion access, numerous states have moved towards making abortion illegal and restricting additional reproductive health services. In South Carolina, Republican state Senators Richard Cash, Rex F. Rice and Daniel B. Verdin III introduced ...Originating from the streets of Chicago, drill music is a creative output of inner-city Black youths. It is defined by real life experiences and perspectives, and whilst drill rappers often document gang-related conflict and anti-establishment narratives in their lyrics and music videos, the rap genre is a crucial mouthpiece of...Even in the face of strong public protest over a set of proposed revisions to criminal laws that infringe Indonesians’ free expression rights, the Indonesian Ministry of Law and Human Rights last month that threatens to further...The U.S. (OFAC)'s of “Tornado Cash” as an entity on the raises important questions that are being discussed around the world. OFAC explained its sanction by saying “Tornado Cash (Tornado) is a virtual currency ...Even if you think that online intermediaries should be more proactive in detecting, deprioritizing, or removing certain user speech, the requirements on intermediaries to review all content before publication—often called “general monitoring” or “upload filtering”—raises serious human rights concerns, both for freedom of expression and for privacy.General monitoring is problematic...Government involvement in content moderation raises serious human rights concerns in every context, and these concerns are further troubling when the involvement originates with law enforcement. We recently filed a with the Meta Oversight Board urging it to treat this issue seriously.When sites cooperate with government agencies, it...Students should not have to fear expulsion for expressing themselves on social media after school and off-campus, but that is just what happened to the plaintiff in C1.G v. Siegfried. Last month, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the student’s expulsion violated his First Amendment rights.The UK government has had to revise its into a proposal that wouldn’t harm users’ basic rights. It has failed to do so, and the bill should be scrapped. The current bill is a threat to free expression, and it undermines...Share It

Email updates on news, actions,and events in your area.DEEPLINKS BLOGShare ItSpecial thanks to legal intern Rachel Sommers, who was the lead author of this post.Visa applicants to the United States are required to disclose personal information including their . And as of , they are required to register their with the U.S. government. According to the State Department, approximately will be affected by this new policy each year.EFF recently filed an in , a case challenging this “Registration Requirement” under the First Amendment. The plaintiffs in the case, two U.S.-based documentary film...

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EFF to Court: Social Media Users Have Privacy and Free Speech Interests in Their Public Information

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