International Law

Facebook undercover

In the UK, police going undercover to spy on Facebook users:

Scotland Yard has set up a special squad to police Facebook, the social networking site, and spy on criminals who brag about their crimes.

While the website is popular with millions who use it to message friends and organise events, police say many criminals also log on.

The Met has a team of cyber police who regularly glean information for major investigations from sites such as Bebo, YouTube and MySpace.

Officers in the newly created Open Source Team are trained to surf websites and infiltrate chatrooms without leaving a trace of their visit or revealing their identities.

Detective Chief Superintendent Martin Hewitt, head of the Metropolitan Intelligence Bureau at the Yard, said: ?Criminals, like the general public, are increasingly using technology to communicate or as a tool to organise their crimes.

?The internet offers a wealth of information that we are able to monitor and use to prevent and detect crimes.

?We are seeing occasions where chartrooms and social networking sites are being used to boast about crimes.

?Cutting-edge techniques and technology, as well as good, old-fashioned, thorough intelligence work, is enabling us to turn the tables on the criminals.?

Read more here (from Telegraph).

Full post as published by Freedom to Differ on April 26, 2008 (boomark / email).