You don’t have to scrutinize Ms. Maribel’s information too hard to gather that there is something fishy about this account. I’d wager that those nearly 100 followers of hers are probably also bots and they probably non-Tweet about botty things. These things are everywhere on Twitter. In all seriousness, I don’t think I’ve been followed by a real person on Twitter in months. And although Facebook certainly has its share of phony accounts, Twitter seems to be the more polluted of the two.

HOWEVER. It turns out that these might not be meaningless bots after all thanks to a new operation from the United States Department of Homeland Security. According to a new report in The Daily Mail, the DHS uses fake Twitter and Facebook accounts to monitor and track people who happen to use “sensitive” words. What kind of sensitive words? Words that despite sounding villainous are actually fairly generic. “The DHS outlined plans to scans blogs, Twitter and Facebook for words such as ‘illegal immigrant’, ‘outbreak’, ‘drill’, ‘strain’, ‘virus’, ‘recovery’, ‘deaths’, ‘collapse’, ‘human to animal’ and ‘trojan’, according to an ‘impact asssessment’ document filed by the agency.” If the DHS catches someone using any of these words and suspects you might be up to no good, it could mean that ” spies from the government read your posts, investigate your account, and attempt to identify you from it, acccording to an online privacy group.” Spies! Human to animal virus death recovery! Okay, DHS, you guys are obviously new to The Internet because just about every one of those keywords of yours could also be easily used in the context of sex and if you were familiar at all with this thing called The Internet you’d realize that 98% of it is porn-related. (P.S. – in case you didn’t know, porn includes sex.)

Not a group to let this trespass of our blessed privacy, everyone on Twitter responded appropriately:

So as if the keyword surveillance probably wasn’t muddled with sexy search results already then the noble crusaders of Twitter have undoubtedly thrown a couple more monkey wrenches into the Big Brothery gears of the DHS. At least I hope it has because if not then the combination of my searches on Twitter for their keywords in addition to my use of all of the words in this article will probably be enough for the feds to punch my ticket to Gitmo later today.

The lawsuit was filed by the ACLU, the New York Civil Liberties Union and the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.

DHS asserts the right to look though the contents of a traveler’s electronic devices – including laptops, cameras and cell phones – and to keep the devices or copy the contents in order to continue searching them once the traveler has been allowed to enter the U.S., regardless of whether the traveler is suspected of any wrongdoing.

“These days, almost everybody carries a cell phone or laptop when traveling, and almost everyone stores information they wouldn’t want to share with government officials – from financial records to love letters to family photos," said Catherine Crump, staff attorney with the ACLU Speech, Privacy and Technology Project.

"Innocent Americans should not be made to feel like the personal information they store on their laptops and cell phones is vulnerable to searches by government officials any time they travel out of the country."

Today’s lawsuit was filed on behalf of the National Press Photographers Association (NPPA), whose members include television and still photographers, editors, students and representatives of the photojournalism industry; NACDL, which is a plaintiff as well as counsel on the case; and Pascal Abidor, a 26-year-old dual French-American citizen who had his laptop searched and confiscated at the Canadian border.

“Unchecked government fishing expeditions into the constitutionally protected materials on an innocent traveler’s laptop or cell phone interfere with the ability of many Americans to do their jobs and do nothing to make us safer," said Melissa Goodman, staff attorney with the ACLU National Security Project. "

Between October 1, 2008 and June 2, 2010, over 6,500 people—nearly 3,000 of them U.S. citizens, were subjected to a search of their electronic devices as they crossed U.S. borders, according to a separate Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed by the ACLU.
 

The Department of Homeland Security recently disclosed the new policies that allow agents to search a laptop’s contents and share the information with other agencies and private organizations for language translation, data decryption or other reasons.

 Russell Feingold

"The policies that have been disclosed are truly alarming," said Sen. Russell Feingold (D-Wis.). "After seeing them, I am more convinced than ever that legislation is needed in order to protect law-abiding Americans from this gross violation of their privacy. I intend to introduce such legislation soon."

The DHS said the policies apply to anyone entering the country, including U.S. citizens, and are needed to prevent terrorism.

The policies have long been in place but were not disclosed until rights groups and business travel groups pressured the government to release information on its procedures after more travelers reported that their laptops, cell phones and other electronic devices had been seized at the border and held for months in some cases.

The policies cover "any device capable of storing information in digital or analog form," including hard drives, flash drives, cell phones, iPods, pagers, video and audio tapes. It also applies to written documents including books, pamphlets and "written materials commonly referred to as ‘pocket trash’ or ‘pocket litter’."

"They’re saying they can rifle through all the information in a traveler’s laptop without having a smidgen of evidence that the traveler is breaking the law," said Greg Nojeim of the Center for Democracy and Technology.

Starting January 12, 2009, people traveling to the U.S. from the 27 visa waiver countries will be required to fill out an Electronic System for Travel Authorization (ESTA) form online three days before departure.

The system will begin a test phase on August 1 and online registration will be required for all citizens traveling to the U.S. from visa waiver countries.  This includes 15 European Union states, Japan and Australia.

Travelers will be asked questions about contagious diseases, mental disorders, physical disorders, drug abuse, criminal convictions, if they have been involved in spying, terrorist activities or genocide.

The permit is good for two years and once completed online, authorization is given in most cases immediately.

The European Commission is monitoring the test to make sure it is not a visa in disguise and is expected to reach a verdict on the program in November.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) says it focuses on passengers who pose a risk to security and that by providing details before they depart, legitimate travelers reduce the risk of being turned away once they arrive.

"The ESTA is not a visa," said DHS attach Jackie Bednarz. "We do recognize that it is an additional step," which take a "couple of minutes" to complete.

"We think the ESTA will clearly help those person who have any kind of travel problem that is not known," said Bednarz.

Currently the online form is free, but Bednarz said that could change. "In the future, there may be a fee," she said but did not offer a timetable.

Visual analytics will be the key. Science Blog said “analysts must meld the encyclopedic eye of Google with the inductive genius of Sherlock Holmes” to accomplish this.

The inspiration of Edward Tufte, visual data display legend, motivates the ongoing work by DHS and its associated research partners:

The centers

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