Did you know that the U.S. Army has a unit that monitors social media for mean posts about generals? It’s called the Protective Services Battalion (PSB) and it’s responsible for safeguarding high-ranking military officers from “assassination, kidnapping, injury or embarrassment”. According to an Army procurement document from 2022 obtained by the Intercept, the PSB now monitors social media for “negative sentiment” about the officers under its protection, as well as for “direct, indirect, and veiled” threats.

The PSB uses a sophisticated surveillance tool that can combine social media data with a wide range of public and non-public information, such as CCTV feeds, radio stations, news outlets, personal records, hacked information, webcams, and even cellular location data. The PSB can also use “geo-fenced” data, which means they can focus their surveillance on a specific area on a digital map. The PSB not only monitors mainstream social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter, but also anonymous and semi-anonymous discussion boards like 4chan and Reddit, as well as chat platforms like Discord and Telegram.

The PSB’s expansion of its surveillance scope raises concerns about privacy and freedom of speech. While the primary focus of the PSB is to protect officials from physical harm, the inclusion of monitoring social media for negative comments reflects a broader effort to protect them from embarrassment. Critics argue that expressing opinions, criticism, or judgments about public officials is a fundamental part of democratic society and should not be deemed sufficient grounds for government agencies to conduct surveillance operations.

I don’t know about you, but this sounds like a massive waste of our hard-earned tax dollars and an abuse of our government. They don’t need to be monitoring our social media accounts for us to say things that they don’t agree with. The last time I checked this was still America and we have the freedom to disagree and even express our contempt and hated of someone without fear of persecution.