Department Of Homeland Security Compiling Database Of Journalists

An April 3 contract listing on a government-run federal business opportunities website seeks "media monitoring services" for the DHS. Already, at least seven companies have applied for the DHS contract. It is unclear how much the contract pays.

While "media monitoring services" may sound innocuous, details in a "Request for Information" (RFI) on the government website outline DHS's plan to build what some are calling a "panopticon."

"Services shall enable NPPD/OUS to monitor traditional news sources as well as social media, identify any and all media coverage related to the Department of Homeland Security or a particular event," the RFI reads. "Services shall provide media comparison tools, design and rebranding tools, communication tools and the ability to identify top media influencers."

The contract seeks applicants to complete five tasks: monitoring online activity and social media; creating a media intelligence and benchmarking dashboard platform; setting up an individualized email alert system; creating a password-protected mobile app for DHS personnel; and developing functionalities for engagement with the media. The RFI elaborates on each task.

The statement of work for the media monitoring services contract includes the requirement that its applicants are able to track more than 290,000 global news sources from media including online, print, broadcast, radio, trade and industry publications, local sources, national/international outlets, traditional news sources and social media. DHS also aims to be able to track such coverage in more than 100 languages and to have a function which can translate them immediately.

The database would also include "present contact details and any other information that could be relevant, including publications this influencer writes for and an overview of the previous coverage published by the influencer," for each "influencer" tracked by the system.

Many of the services that the department is seeking were once available to them, including real-time tracking. Dataminr, a Twitter-owned news discovery tool that combs through billions of tweets in real time, "senses critical events as they happen and alerts professionals in news, finance, public sector, corporate security and communications faster than traditional sources," according to Dataminr. It's able to do all of this with the help of artificial intelligence and Twitter's Firehose, which is the only way to access 100 percent of tweets on the platform in real-time.

Dataminr nixed their contract with DHS in December 2016, cutting off dozens of fusion centers from real-time analytics from their platform after Twitter said its platform wasn't meant for surveillance. Dataminr also dropped their contract with the CIA, as it is technically an intelligence agency, but not the FBI, as it is technically a law enforcement agency.  (Forbes, April 6, 2018)