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Date: April 30, 2024 Tue
Time: 2:41 am
Time: 2:41 am
Results for media and communications
3 results foundAuthor: Frank, Richard Title: Social Media Sites: New Fora for Criminal, Communication, and Investigation Opportunities Summary: Over the last two decades, rapid advances in communication technologies have significantly enhanced efficiency and information sharing. The spread of online discussion fora and most recently, social networking websites such as Facebook and Twitter, has helped rekindle and maintain connections between friends and acquaintances, facilitated the building of various online communities that share common interests, and created a new space for entrepreneurship and business transactions. Social media tools help to link people with common interests, and facilitate a wide variety of activities in the legitimate sector; it follows that such popular communication and business tools may also facilitate work in the illegitimate sector, perhaps even the work of criminal organizations. The current research complements and builds on existing empirical information regarding the use of social media by criminal organizations and law enforcement by way of literature review and interviews with law enforcement officials and social media experts. All law enforcement respondents and social media experts indicated that law enforcement personnel and organizations have, and continue to, employ social media to connect to the communities that they serve. The goals of law enforcement use of social media as identified by respondents were to connect to and interact with the community, and to proactively monitor the community for disruptive events and activities. Respondents reflected on the challenges they faced when conducting such investigations online. These included the ability to find the correct person among the large number of online social media users, the procedural difficulties associated with acquiring private information from social media data owners, and the time consuming nature of following forensically sound procedures when collecting online evidence, particularly when it is done in such a way as to not leave behind traces of police activities. One recurring recommendation from respondents, which also appears in the literature, is that police officers need more basic training on using computers and the Internet for open source intelligence gathering. Respondents suggest that it is important that law enforcement personnel have access to different computers, websites, and software so that they can be more fluent with them and utilize a variety of tools. Respondents indicated that law enforcement personnel need to accept that police officers will want to use online social media sites for personal reasons. But, they warned that separating police work from personal work is a mandatory requirement. They expressed concern that many police officers do not understand the danger of posting photos and personal information on online social media sites (OSMS), even if they have strict privacy settings. Some respondents suggested that a set of principles be created and followed regarding how police should and can obtain evidence and what they should (not) do to a crime scene where a computer is involved. Respondents suggested that such a guideline would allow law enforcement personnel to be more effective and consistent in gathering evidence from computers. Moreover, such a guideline may help minimize trails left by law enforcement personnel during investigation. Most respondents agreed that persons suspected of organized crime involvement do not tend to display their illicit activities on their social media profiles, but instead use social media to keep connected to their networks. The intersections between the demographic characteristics of persons who use social media and those of persons involved with organized crime may be useful for targeting investigation and communication efforts. This comparison illustrates that, in general, persons involved in organized crime tend to be late-onset offenders, older than those who frequent social media sites, and may perhaps be less likely to use social media. Exceptionally, the two blog sites described in this report, Blogger and Wordpress, were shown to have an older cohort of users. It is possible that members of criminal organizations, like the older general public, may be more attracted to blog sites than to Twitter, FaceBook, or MySpace, and as such may be users or consumers of such social media. Unlike the typical social media user, women involved in criminal organizations tend to be non-Caucasian, with disadvantaged socio-economic backgrounds (Beare 2010). As such, it is possible that female organized crime offenders are even less likely than their male counterparts to use social media sites. Details: Ottawa: Research and National Coordination, Organized Crime Division, Law Enforcement and Policy Branch, Public Safety Canada, 2011. 27p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed July 7, 2012 at: http://www.sfu.ca/~icrc/content/PS-SP-socialmedia.pdf Year: 2011 Country: Canada URL: http://www.sfu.ca/~icrc/content/PS-SP-socialmedia.pdf Shelf Number: 125499 Keywords: Criminal InvestigationsInformation TechnologyMedia and CommunicationsOrganized Crime (Canada)Social Media |
Author: Madison, Laura Title: A Survey of Official and Unofficial Law Enforcement Twitter Accounts in Canada, the United Kingdom, and the United States Summary: To use Twitter to its fullest potential for public communications, emergency management, and other functions, law enforcement agencies must first understand the medium -- not only how citizens use it, but also how their peers use it both officially and unofficially. This study, a survey of 1,089 police and police-related Twitter accounts, used 25 different criteria to show how agencies and officers are using Twitter, where they can improve, and implications for their future use. Details: Canada: Canadian Association of Police on Social Media, 2010. 22p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed August 22, 2012 at http://www.sfu.ca/iccrc/content/twitter.survey.pdf Year: 2010 Country: International URL: http://www.sfu.ca/iccrc/content/twitter.survey.pdf Shelf Number: 126091 Keywords: Media and CommunicationsPolice BehaviorPolice-Community RelationsSocial Media, Twitter |
Author: Global Justice Information Sharing Initiative Title: Developing a Policy on the Use of Social Media in Intelligence and Investigative Activities: Guidance and Recommendations Summary: The advent of social media sites has created an environment of greater connection among people, businesses, and organizations, serving as a useful tool to keep in touch and interact with one another. These sites enable increased information sharing at a more rapid pace, building and enhancing relationships and helping friends, coworkers, and families to stay connected. Persons or groups can instantaneously share photos or videos, coordinate events, and/or provide updates that are of interest to their friends, family, or customer base. Social media sites can also serve as a platform to enable persons and groups to express their First Amendment rights, including their political ideals, religious beliefs, or views on government and government agencies. Many government entities, including law enforcement agencies, are also using social media sites as a tool to interact with the public, such as posting information on crime trends, updating citizens on community events, or providing tips on keeping citizens safe. Social media sites have become useful tools for the public and law enforcement entities, but criminals are also using these sites for wrongful purposes. Social media sites may be used to coordinate a criminal-related flash mob or plan a robbery, or terrorist groups may use social media sites to recruit new members and espouse their criminal intentions. Social media sites are increasingly being used to instigate or conduct criminal activity, and law enforcement personnel should understand the concept and function of these sites, as well as know how social media tools and resources can be used to prevent, mitigate, respond to, and investigate criminal activity. To ensure that information obtained from social media sites for investigative and criminal intelligence-related activity is used lawfully while also ensuring that individuals’ and groups’ privacy, civil rights, and civil liberties are protected, law enforcement agencies should have a social media policy (or include the use of social media sites in other information-related policies). This social media policy should communicate how information from social media sites can be utilized by law enforcement, as well as the differing levels of engagement—such as apparent/overt, discrete, or covert—with subjects when law enforcement personnel access social media sites, in addition to specifying the authorization requirements, if any, associated with each level of engagement. These levels of engagement may range from law enforcement personnel “viewing” information that is publicly available on social media sites to the creation of an undercover profile to directly interact with an identified criminal subject online. Articulating the agency’s levels of engagement and authorization requirements is critical to agency personnel’s understanding of how information from social media sites can be used by law enforcement and is a key aspect of a social media policy. Social media sites and resources should be viewed as another tool in the law enforcement investigative toolbox and should be used in a manner that adheres to the same principles that govern all law enforcement activity, such as actions must be lawful and personnel must have a defined objective and a valid law enforcement purpose for gathering, maintaining, or sharing personally identifiable information (PII). In addition, any law enforcement action involving undercover activity (including developing an undercover profile on a social media site) should address supervisory approval, required documentation of activity, periodic reviews of activity, and the audit of undercover processes and behavior. Law enforcement agencies should also not collect or maintain the political, religious, or social views, associations, or activities of any individual or group, association, corporation, business, partnership, or organization unless there is a legitimate public safety purpose. These aforementioned principles help define and place limitations on law enforcement actions and ensure that individuals’ and groups’ privacy, civil rights, and civil liberties are diligently protected. When law enforcement personnel adhere to these principles, they are ensuring that their actions are performed with the highest respect for the law and the community they serve, consequently fostering the community’s trust in and support for law enforcement action. The Developing a Policy on the Use of Social Media in Intelligence and Investigative Activities: Guidance and Recommendations is designed to guide law enforcement agency personnel through the development of a social media policy by identifying elements that should be considered when drafting a policy, as well as issues to consider when developing a policy, focusing on privacy, civil rights, and civil liberties protections. This resource can also be used to modify and enhance existing policies to include social media information. All law enforcement agencies, regardless of size and jurisdiction, can benefit from the guidance identified in this resource. The key elements identified in this resource can be applied to “traditional” social media sites (such as Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube) and are also applicable as different and new types of social media sites emerge and proliferate. As a policy is developed, the agency privacy officer and/or legal counsel should be consulted and involved in the process. Additionally, many agencies have an existing privacy policy that includes details on how to safeguard privacy, civil rights, and civil liberties, and an agency’s social media-related policy should also communicate how these protections will be upheld when using information obtained from social media sites. Social media sites have emerged as a method for instantaneous connection among people and groups; information obtained from these sites can also be a valuable resource for law enforcement in the prevention, identification, investigation, and prosecution of crimes. To that end, law enforcement leadership should ensure that their agency has a social media policy that outlines the associated procedures regarding the use of social media-related information in investigative and criminal intelligence activities, while articulating the importance of privacy, civil rights, and civil liberties protections. Moreover, the same procedures and prohibitions placed on law enforcement officers when patrolling the community or conducting an investigation should be in place when agency personnel are accessing, viewing, collecting, using, storing, retaining, and disseminating information obtained from social media sites. As these sites increase in popularity and usefulness, a social media policy is vital to ensuring that information from social media used in criminal intelligence and investigative activities is lawfully used, while also ensuring that individuals’ and groups’ privacy, civil rights, and civil liberties are diligently protected. Details: Washington, DC: Global Justice Information Sharing Initiative, 2013. 46p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed May 29, 2013 at: https://it.ojp.gov/gist/Document/132 Year: 2013 Country: United States URL: https://it.ojp.gov/gist/Document/132 Shelf Number: 128845 Keywords: Criminal IntelligenceCriminal InvestigationsInformation TechnologyIntelligence GatheringMedia and CommunicationsSocial Media |