USA: Feds Demand Facebook Share Information on Anti-Trump Protesters - by Adam Edelman

The Justice Department is demanding that Facebook turn over information from three accounts that could provide access to the personal details of thousands of activists who expressed interest in anti-Trump rallies.

The department obtained search warrants targeting three Facebook accounts that were used to organize Inauguration Day protests against Donald Trump, the ACLU said late Thursday. But accessing those accounts would provide information on thousands of other users who "liked" an anti-Trump Facebook page, the group explained.

The ACLU’s Washington, D.C., office said in a statement it would fight the enforcement of the search warrants.

"Opening up the entire contents of a personal Facebook page for review by the government is a gross invasion of privacy," said Scott Michelman, a senior staff attorney at ACLU. "When law enforcement officers can comb through records concerning political organizing in opposition to the very administration for which those officers work, the result is the chilling of First Amendment-protected political activity." 

The warrants were issued as part of an ongoing case by the Justice Department against people who allegedly broke laws while protesting Trump's Jan. 20 inauguration in Washington. Prosecutors have said the website, DisruptJ20.org, was used to organize "a violent riot." 

One search warrant was issued for the DisruptJ20 Facebook page, which has since been renamed Resist This, requiring the group’s moderator, Emmelia Talarico, to hand over "nonpublic lists of people who planned to attend political organizing events and even the names of people who simply liked, followed, reacted to, commented o or otherwise engaged with the content on the Facebook page," the ACLU said in a motion filed Thursday in U.S. Superior Court in Washington.

That could include nearly 6,000 Facebook users who "liked" the page from Nov. 1, 2016, to Feb. 9, 2017.

Two other warrants obtained by the Justice Department would require Facebook to hand over "all information from the personal Facebook profiles of local DisruptJ20 activists' Lacy MacAuley and Legba Carrefour from Nov. 1, 2016, through Feb. 9, 2017.

The warrants demand "all private messages, friend lists, status updates, comments, photos, video and other private information solely intended for the users’ Facebook friends and family, even if they have nothing to do with Inauguration Day," the ACLU said.

Read more: Feds Demand Facebook Share Information on Anti-Trump Protesters - NBC News

Personal Privacy: Google Glass targeted as symbol by anti-tech crowd - Doug Gross

Glass, Google's high-profile entry into the world of wearable tech, may help launch a revolution if it's released later this year as expected. But test models already on the street have begun playing a more unlikely role -- as symbols in a simmering fight over Silicon Valley's impact on the city of San Francisco.

It's a local story, but one with ramifications everywhere as Google on Tuesday made the connected headsets available to the public for the first time in a one-day sale.

While our smartphones drop easily into pockets and tablets get zipped up in cases or backpacks, wearables such as Glass are, quite literally, in your face all the time.

The $1,500 device, which displays Web content on a tiny screen, signals its wearer as a likely member of an affluent tech elite. And Glass also can discreetly shoot photos or video, which some people view as invasive.

Recently, protesters picketed in front of the private home of Kevin Rose, co-founder of Digg and now a partner with Google Ventures. The protesters, who posted signs calling Rose a "parasite," claimed his group, which helps Google decide which startups to invest money in, has helped to inflate prices in the city.

Read more: Google Glass targeted as symbol by anti-tech crowd - CNN.com