[LINK] Facebook scans chats and posts for criminal activity

[Kim Holburn]

http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-57471570-93/facebook-scans-chats-and-posts-for-criminal-activity/

> Facebook scans chats and posts for criminal activity
> 
> Facebook's monitoring software focuses on conversations between members who have a loose relationship on the social network.
> 
> by Emil Protalinski
> July 12, 2012 5:45 PM PDT
>  
> Facebook has added sleuthing to its array of data-mining capabilities, scanning your posts and chats for criminal activity. If the social-networking giant detects suspicious behavior, it flags the content and determines if further steps, such as informing the police, are required.
> 
> The new tidbit about the company's monitoring system comes from a Reuters interview with Facebook Chief Security Officer Joe Sullivan

....

> Facebook's software focuses on conversations between members who have a loose relationship on the social network. For example, if two users aren't friends, only recently became friends, have no mutual friends, interact with each other very little, have a significant age difference, and/or are located far from each other, the tool pays particular attention.
> 
> The scanning program looks for certain phrases found in previously obtained chat records from criminals, including sexual predators (because of the Reuters story, we know of at least one alleged child predator who is being brought before the courts as a direct result of Facebook's chat scanning). The relationship analysis and phrase material have to add up before a Facebook employee actually looks at communications and makes the final decision of whether to ping the authorities.
> 
> "We've never wanted to set up an environment where we have employees looking at private communications, so it's really important that we use technology that has a very low false-positive rate," Sullivan told Reuters. While details of the tool are still scarce, it's a well-known fact that Facebook cooperates with the police, since, like any company, it has to abide by the law. In fact, just a few months ago, Facebook complied with a police subpoena by sending over 62 pages of photos, Wall posts, messages, contacts, and past activity on the site for a murder suspect.


http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/07/12/us-usa-internet-predators-idUSBRE86B05G20120712

> Social networks scan for sexual predators, with uneven results

> (Reuters) - On March 9 of this year, a piece of Facebook software spotted something suspicious.
> 
> A man in his early thirties was chatting about sex with a 13-year-old South Florida girl and planned to meet her after middle-school classes the next day.
> 
> Facebook's extensive but little-discussed technology for scanning postings and chats for criminal activity automatically flagged the conversation for employees, who read it and quickly called police.
> 
> Officers took control of the teenager's computer and arrested the man the next day, said Special Agent Supervisor Jeffrey Duncan of the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. The alleged predator has pleaded not guilty to multiple charges of soliciting a minor.
> 
> "The manner and speed with which they contacted us gave us the ability to respond as soon as possible," said Duncan, one of a half-dozen law enforcement officials interviewed who praised Facebook for triggering inquiries.
> 
> Facebook is among the many companies that are embracing a combination of new technologies and human monitoring to thwart sex predators. Such efforts generally start with automated screening for inappropriate language and exchanges of personal information, and extend to using the records of convicted pedophiles' online chats to teach the software what to seek out.
> 
> Yet even though defensive techniques are now available and effective they can be expensive. They can also alienate some of a site's target audience -- especially teen users who expect more freedom of expression. While many top sites catering to young children are quite vigilant, the same can't be said for the burgeoning array of online options for the 13- to 18-year-old set.
> 
> "There are companies out there that are doing a very good job, working within the confines of what they have available," said Brooke Donahue, a supervisory special agent with an FBI team devoted to Internet predators and child pornography. "There are companies out there that are more concerned about profitability."

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-- 
Kim Holburn
IT Network & Security Consultant
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