HSDL Critical Releases in Homeland Security: The Crisis of Social Media

The most recent posting by the Homeland Security Digital Library includes a link to an interesting article titled Freedom On The Net 2019: The Crisis of Social Media (32 page pdf). It is subtitled "What was once a liberating technology has become a conduit for surveillance and electoral manipulation." (The report was prepared by Freedom House, an independent watchdog organization dedicated to the expansion of freedom and democracy around the world.) Freedom on the Net is a comprehensive study of internet freedom in 65 countries around the globe, covering 87 percent of the world’s internet users. It tracks improvements and declines in internet freedom conditions each year. The countries included in the study have been selected to represent diverse geographical regions and regime types. From the document:

"Internet freedom is increasingly imperiled by the tools and tactics of digital authoritarianism, which have spread rapidly around the globe. Repressive regimes, elected incumbents with authoritarian ambitions, and unscrupulous partisan operatives have exploited the unregulated spaces of social media platforms, converting them into instruments for political distortion and societal control. While social media have at times served as a level playing field for civic discussion, they are now tilting dangerously toward illiberalism, exposing citizens to an unprecedented crackdown on their fundamental freedoms. Moreover, a startling variety of governments are deploying advanced tools to identify and monitor users on an immense scale. As a result of these trends, global internet freedom declined for the ninth consecutive year in 2019."