Law Enforcement and the Social Media Stakeout

Law enforcement techniques that were previously used by only federal agencies are becoming more readily accessible to law enforcement at the local level.

Police sitting in a car, with a cup of coffee in hand, waiting for something to "go down" at the building across the street is a scene we have all watched countless times in movies over the years.  While possibly not as dramatic for cinematic purposes, today police are able participate in big data stakeouts from their own desks.  At a meeting last month for the International Chiefs of Police (IACP), a cloud based service was unveiled that will allow local law enforcement to monitor social networks for evidence and clues of crimes committed in the brick and mortar world.

A piece in ArsTechnica noted that a poll of 1,200 law enforcement officers, as conducted by LexisNexis, found that four out of five officers are now using social media as part of their investigations.  New SaaS programs allow police to aggregate information culled from social media sources and then link to databases with public records to enable law enforcement to cross reference the information gathered.  The article also noted that one of the services providing this type of assistance will even "monitor the general mood of postings and pick up potential threats of violence."

While police have been using social media for some time as an aid to investigations, new technology and services are providing them with more elaborate tools to assist them with their online efforts.

Creating Fake Profile of Your Competitor on LinkedIn…Bad Idea

If you think making bad choices on social media is limited to high school students and politicians, you should take a look at AvePoint, Inc. and AvePoint Public Sector, Inc. v. Power Tools, Inc. d/b/a Axceler and Michael X. Burns.

In this Virginia, District Court case, the court refused to dismiss most counts in the complaint brought by AvePoint, Inc. against its software competitor, Axceler.  The complaint alleges that Axceler and its agents made false, defamatory, and deceptive claims and statements regarding Avepoint through both Twitter and LinkedIn, as well as through direct communications with customers and prospective customers.  Specifically, the allegations against Axceler state that the company attempted to confuse customers into falsely believing that (i) AvePoint is a Chinese company, not an American company, (ii)  AvePoint’s software is not made, developed or supported in the U.S., (iii) AvePoint’s software is maintained in India, (iv) that Axceler’s ControlPoint software is “Microsoft recommended” over AvePoint’s DocAve software, (v) AvePoint’s customers are “dumping out of 3 year deals in year 2 to buy Axceler’s ControlPoint, and (vi) Axceler uses its maintenance revenue to improve its customers’ existing products, whereas AvePoint uses its maintenance revenue to develop new products to which its customers have no access.

If all of the allegations are true, it appears the defendant went to remarkable lengths to execute its campaign against the plaintiff.  The complaint alleges that the defendant created an account on LinkedIn for a fictitious AvePoint representative named Jim Chung and, in connection with the account, used the plaintiff’s registered trademark.  Emphasizing the confusion caused by the defendant’s actions, the plaintiff noted Jim Chung’s LinkedIn connection list.  Further, taking full advantage of the opportunities afforded by social media, the defendant’s Regional Vice President of Sales for Western North America, while at the SharePoint conference in Las Vegas, tweeted in regard to the fictitious AvePoint representative, “Just ran into jim chung from avePoint Good guy.” To add further credibility to Jim Chung’s existence, another Axceler employee tweeted, “@MICHAELBURNS Free Jimmy! #Axceler.”

The District Court refused Axceler’s request to dismiss most of the nine counts set out in AvePoint’s complaint.  The counts the court refused to dismiss included defamation, breach of contract (defendant also allegedly acquired trial software from the plaintiff through deceptive means), trademark infringement, false association or false endorsement under the Lanham Act, False Advertisement under the Lanham Act and certain violations of Virginia law.

The court’s full opinion is available here. 

Facebook Considers Using Cursor Tracking Technology

The Wall Street Journal reports that Facebook is currently looking into technology that will enable the social network to track the location of a user’s cursor on their screen or interface.

The Journal noted that Facebook would not be the first company to engage in this type of behavioral tracking as Shutterstock, a digital image marketplace, has already done so.  The article quotes Shutterstock CEO, Jon Oringer, as saying, “Today, we are looking at every move a user makes, in order to optimize the Shutterstock experience.”

The potential Facebook tracking technology could collect data on how long a user’s cursor hovers over a part of the website and whether user’s newsfeed is visible at a specific time on the user’s mobile phone.  Facebook is still in the process of testing the technology, but the Journal reports that the company should know whether it will be proceeding with the technology within months.

Ken Rudin, Facebook’s head of analytics, is working on increasing the volume of the company’s available data and storing it in a way that can be accessed more efficiently. He referred to the review of the new technology as a “never-ending phase” noting that it will not necessarily be rolled out.

With the knowledge that Facebook is now considering this technology and, if it uses it, will not be the first company to do so, another layer of behavioral tracking can be added to the myriad ways data can be collected and used on social media platforms.