FBI Must Disclose Existence of Social Media Monitoring Program

The FBI can’t refuse to confirm or deny the existence of records pertaining to its social media monitoring program in response to an ACLU Freedom of Information Act request, a California federal district court said.

The FBI’s response was inappropriate because answering the ACLU’s questions won’t reveal any specific means of surveillance, the opinion by Judge Edward M. Chen of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California said.

The ACLU claimed the government was taking steps to monitor social media websites to track U.S. citizens and non-citizens as part of its “extreme vetting” of immigrants, and that ...