Even bigger Big Brother: Facebook purchases Israeli facial recognition company Face.com

Via: Activist Post
Wednesday, June 20, 2012
Madison Ruppert

Perhaps it’s no surprise that Facebook has purchased the facial recognition startup Face.com, since Facebook hascome under fire from European regulators for revealing a massive facial recognition database and been busted forspying on the text messages of smartphone users, showing a complete disregard for privacy.

If you continue to use Facebook in a state of ignorant bliss, hopefully this will help you wake up to the reality of what this internet giant is really up to.

As a Facebook spokesperson put it, this acquisition seems purely logical and perfectly in line with their business model.

“People who use Facebook enjoy sharing photos and memories with their friends, and Face.com’s technology has helped to provide the best photo experience,” said the Facebook spokesperson to VentureBeat. “This transaction simply brings a world-class team and a long-time technology vendor in house.”

It also greatly enhances their facial recognition capabilities which Facebook will also most likely be applying to all photos captured by the other company recently purchased by Facebook: Instagram.

The privacy issues inherent in Faceboook’s move to snatch up Face.com are so blatant and impossible to ignore that even InformationWeek has raised the issue in an article entitled, “Facebook Buys Face.com: At What Privacy Cost?”

Read More At: ActivistPost.com

Document Proves DHS Is Monitoring Social Media For Government Criticism

Infowars.com
Paul Joseph Watson
Thursday, February 23, 2012

A Homeland Security training manual belies claims made by DHS representatives during a Congressional hearing last week that the federal agency is only monitoring social media outlets for “situational awareness,” and proves the fact that Bis Sis is also tracking online criticism of government, including discussion of airport body scanners.

“Analysts for a Department of Homeland Security program that monitors social networks like Twitter and Facebook have been instructed to produce reports on policy debates related to the department, a newly disclosed manual shows,”reports the New York Times.

The manual, entitledDepartment of Homeland Security National Operations Center Media Monitoring Capability Desktop Reference Binder, was obtained by the Electronic Privacy Information Center via a FOIA request.

The controversy over DHS spying on social media erupted last month following the release of 300 documents which detailed how DHS had hired an outside contractor, General Dynamics Advanced Information Systems, to monitor social media outlets along with a list of websites, on a “24/7/365 basis,” in order to uncover “any media reports that reflect adversely on the U.S. Government and the Department of Homeland Security.”

During a subsequent Congressional hearing on the matter, DHS representatives Mary Callahan and Richard Chávez denied the fact that tracking criticism of government agencies formed any part of the program, and that the effort was merely aimed at developing “situational awareness” of potential threats, mostly related to extreme weather events.

However, the 2011 manual makes it abundantly clear that the program was a backdoor effort to keep tabs on what the American people were saying about not just the DHS, but a whole host of federal agencies, including the CIA, the ATF, the TSA, FEMA, as well as organizations outside of the U.S. government such as the United Nations and the Red Cross.

The ‘items of interest’ listed in the document which require monitoring of social media include, “policy directives, debates and implementations related to DHS.”

In addition, the list of keywords the DHS is tasked with monitoring include terms that have little to do with “situational awareness.”

During last week’s hearing, Callaham claimed that such keywords were restricted to “you know, flood, tornado and things like that.” In reality, the manual also directs DHS analysts to search for terms such as “China, cops, hacking, illegal immigrants, Iran, Iraq, marijuana, organized crime, police, pork and radicals.”

The words “militia,” “riot,” “body scanner,” and “nationalist” are also included in the list of keywords the DHS is tasked with monitoring.

The fact that Homeland Security is monitoring what people say about airport body scanners, in the aftermath of a wider national basklash against the TSA as a whole, dovetails with how the TSA has subjected people who refuse to use them to undue suspicion and questioning.

“The D.H.S. continues to monitor the Internet for criticism of the government,” EPIC’s Ginger McCall said in reference to the document. “This suspicionless, overbroad monitoring quells legitimate First Amendment activity and exceeds the agency’s legal authority.”

Source: InfoWars.com