Plans to intensify monitoring of social media cause uproar

Social media users were up in arms on Monday after reports surfaced of a new surveillance system set to be implemented by the Interior Ministry to monitor social media activity.

This came in response to a scoop published by Magdy al-Gallad in Al-Watan newspaper, in which he leaked plans by the Interior Ministry to impose an “electronic grip” on internet activity.

According to Al-Watan’s report, the ministry will enforce a new mechanism that will enable it to have access to data on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and Google.

The Interior Ministry said it set up a “monitoring instrument,” to deal with security risks on social media, which includes material posted that involves contempt of religion, spreading rumors, slander, inciting violence and rebellion, calling for protests and sit-ins, encouraging debauchery and “liaising with the enemy,” among other threats listed by the ministry in the leaked report.

The ministry’s new mechanism aims to “identify those who pose a threat to society,” as well as analyze different opinions.

The system will identify terms and expressions considered to be in violation of the law and general morals. It will also analyze the opinions and trends of social media users by tracing the most common topics, according to the report.

The ministry’s system will enable it to monitor everything published on users’ social media accounts in a “timeline format.”

It will also enable it to monitor “followers, fans and friends,” of certain accounts and add them to “special lists” in the system.

The leak of this report on Al-Watan prompted social media users to initiate sarcastic hashtags on Twitter condemning the ministry’s initiative, such as “We are being watched,” and “Send a message to your private informant.”

Interior Minister Mohamed Ibrahim said that the new surveillance system is far from a mechanism that limits freedoms, but has actually been created within a framework of developing the ministry’s technical security system, state owned MENA reported.

Ibrahim said that it is “illogical” for the ministry to limit freedoms after “two great revolutions that brought the police back into the people’s embrace.”

He said the system is meant to trace security threats that are spread on social media, especially when it comes to terrorism.

The system has been used in the US and other European countries and has been shown at international security conferences. It will also be able to deal with Arabic and “Franco-Arab” languages as well as English. 

The monitoring of social media is not a violation of privacy but rather an “achievement in adopting technology,” according to an Interior Ministry source. 

In a phone-in on the talk show “Bekhtesar”, aired on the privately owned Al-Mehwar channel, Deputy Interior Minister for Media and Public Relations Abdel Fattah Othman defended the ministry’s “system” to monitor Facebook and Twitter, saying it is meant to “protect the nation.”

He said that this kind of monitoring instrument is an achievement on part of the ministry, which is adopting technology to “protect my family and your family.”

“Let’s say we monitor the word ‘explosives’,” Othman said, “any post with this word in it would be under our surveillance.”

He maintained that monitoring social media is not a violation of privacy and is done in accordance with the law.

Othman also added that he respects citizens' rights to knowledge. He rejected criticism of monitoring social media, denying that it is a “return to the Mubarak era.”

Ahmed Gharbeia, an ICT consultant with the Arab Digital Expression Foundation (ADEF), told Mada Masr that the ministry’s employment of this instrument is very likely, since the means and technology for such surveillance already exist.

While social media monitoring is already in place, Gharbeia said, it has been on a much smaller scale.

“It is clear the ministry is investing more in this new instrument and is going for a more complicated surveillance system,” he said.

Gharbeia added he is personally interested in how the system will be implemented to monitor Arabic content.

“I am wondering how far they will go when it comes to analyzing and understanding trends with Arabic content,” he said. “It’s not easy but it’s also not impossible.”

He said that the state will inevitable dip into public funds to implement this new system, and train staff to use it.