A recent Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request by the Brennan Center for Justice has revealed a Department of Homeland Security program aimed at collecting data on social media accounts.
Called “Night Fury,” the program came to the attention of the Brennan Center through a DHS Inspector General report released in March 2022, which was prompted by concerns over potential privacy violations resulting from the program.
The Brennan Center said in a press release that it was then able to uncover more documents related to Night Fury through the FOIA request. According to the IG report, Night Fury was created to “identify potential terrorism risks” on social media. To that end, DHS’s Office of Science and Engineering contracted with the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) at a cost of $790,000 to collect social media data.
Night Fury was expected to expand the tools at DHS’s disposal by developing innovative methods for analyzing social media posts. The program was initially intended to detect “pro-terrorist” networks, with the possibility of later expanding and applying the methods developed to other areas, such as drug trafficking and human smuggling.
One of the program’s tasks was to analyze Facebook and Twitter accounts, identifying those that were apparently “pro-terrorist” and ranking them according to a “risk score.” DHS and UAB worked together to “identify relevant attributes” that could lead to an individual’s or group’s account being labeled as such.
The intention was to limit human involvement as much as possible, instead using algorithms to perform the analysis.
UAB was responsible for compiling the relevant account information and sending it to DHS.
“It appears that social media users could be labeled as threats in the absence of any evidence of criminal activity or planning, or based on a misinterpretation of innocuous behavior,” according to the Brennan Center’s analysis.
The revelation that DHS was conducting a program to monitor speech in public fora comes about a year after DHS had to “pause” its plan for a “Disinformation Governance Board” after questions arose about the board’s leader Nina Jankowicz and whether she could be a fair arbiter of free speech, as reported by The Dallas Express.
Night Fury, which began in September 2018 and was supposed to run until December 2021, was shut down in 2020. The Dallas Express reached out to DHS for additional information or comment on the program but received no response by the publication deadline.
