Twitter has banned US intelligence services use analytics service

US intelligence agencies, like Russian colleagues, are obsessed with monitoring social networks.

Twitter has blocked US intelligence agencies access to the Dataminr analytical tool for data mining tweets on geotags in real time, writes WSJ . This service is used by companies in the financial industry, information security, management, risk management, media companies, etc.

Twitter owns a five percent stake in Dataminr. Dataminr management is forced to listen to the shareholder on whom the business is completely dependent. It was at the request of Twitter that the special services accounts in the Dataminr analytical service were closed, a source in the intelligence community told the WSJ. He said that Twitter is afraid to be caught in collaboration with US intelligence, that is, he does not want to have anything in common with them.

Scouts will find other ways to tweet data, but the fact of disobeying them is certainly unpleasant.
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In a press statement, Twitter representatives commented that tweets are open to everyone, and the security services can analyze them on their own, like any other user.

The source also said that only the accounts of intelligence agencies in Dataminr were closed after the end of the trial period, while the Department of Homeland Security account is still active.

Intelligence agencies used Dataminr for intelligence and rapid response. For example, in 2013, with the help of Dataminr, within 10 minutes it was possible to quickly identify a problem with the sudden closure of the entrance gate during the president’s inaugural speech — a message on this topic immediately started on Twitter, which quickly resolved the situation before the problem escalated .


^{Ditiminr situation analysis in real time for 10 minutes of activity on Twitter, during inaugural speech (left) and tuple movement (right) with extrapolation of users' location in the future}

Dataminr is not tied to predetermined keywords, it adapts to the situation as events unfold, analyzing tweets in a given geographic area.



This approach allows you to quickly find out about emergencies of any type, get coordinates and photographs of the incident.



American intelligence services have recently become obsessed with monitoring social networks. Due to the leakage of secret documents, the CIA recently learned that the subsidiary venture capital fund of the CIA In-Q-Tel has invested in dozens of startups to process data from social networks, data mining, forecasting the future, etc.

Here is a list of companies that received investment from the CIA.



As you can see, there are Dataminr in the list. There is a conflict of interest, but in this case, the opinion of Twitter is more important because it is the main provider of data.

Among other funded companies are, for example, the company PATHAR. She is developing Dunami software to build a social graph and connections between citizens based on the network of friends on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and other social networks. The program uses the FBI for investigations.


^{Dunami program for building a social graph and connections between citizens based on the network of friends on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and other social networks}

Similar software is probably used in Russia (for example, for analyzing the social network Vkontakte, in which almost 100% of young people are registered), although the development has so far been kept secret.