One of Eight! Biden Disinfo Board Yet Another Gov’t Tech Operation Ripe for Abuse

The Orwellian Disinformation Governance Board, also called the Biden administration’s “Ministry of Truth,” is just the latest in a list of eight times that government has wielded tech to target Americans invasively.

Among other actions, the U.S. government logged lawmakers’ tweets about the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) spied on citizens’ social media posts and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) issued court orders to tech companies for detailed private data, according to reports. However, the Disinformation Governance Board (DGB), a vaguely defined new entity in online free speech is an additional escalation. It has become disturbingly common in recent years for the government to target Americans’ online data and free speech rights — something it shouldn’t be in the business of doing at all. 

Here are eight examples of the government’s overreach in collecting data and/or attempting to control speech.

1. The Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) recently announced DGB has been nicknamed the “Ministry of Truth” for the threat it poses to free speech. The board’s goals, powers, membership, funding source, and other details are all unclear. This is one of my concerns. Since then, the board has paused but is not disbanded.

2. Sharyl Attkisson, an investigative journalist, obtained emails from the CDC through a Freedom of Information Act request (FOIA), and put them online. The documents reportedly revealed that the CDC tracked many lawmakers’ tweets about the agency and vaccinations. These documents were broken down by party affiliations and labeled with links, dates and names.

3. Some aspects of data tracking by the government are sometimes made transparent by the government. The government website analytics.usa.gov reports that thousands of U.S. government websites have already shared real-time sensitive information with Google and will continue to do so. Google has data sharing agreements with the National Institutes of Health and USPS. Reclaim The Net says that the data came from sensitive sites, where Americans uploaded detailed data.

4. USPS admitted to spying on Americans’ social media posts in April 2021, according to the New York Post. The agency’s so-called “Internet Covert Operations Program” (iCOP) tracked supposedly “inflammatory” posts on Parler, Facebook and other platforms, USPS Chief Postal Inspector Gary Barksdale confirmed to the House Oversight and Reform Committee.

5. Reclaim The Net reports that the USPS recently requested a digital ID data base, which would also include expansion of USPS’s Informed Delivery service. USPS would also reportedly provide online name and address verification to government agencies, and add a “confidence level” that a person lives at a specific address. These actions could increase the government’s intrusion into American citizens’ daily lives.

6. Apple was found to have partnered with many states to make digital IDs available for their cell phones in November 2021. States paid Apple to implement the program, in which the company retained authority over details like launch dates of states’ digital ID programs and device types that would be compatible with the digital IDs. Per the program, states encourage “key stakeholders in federal and state government,” such as law enforcement, to adopt digital IDs. People who choose to opt into the digital program will be able to use their digital IDs instead of physical government-issued IDs.

7. In April 2020, Apple and Google joined forces to utilize Bluetooth technology for helping governments and agencies to track contact during the COVID-19 epidemic. One aspect of contact tracing was to notify individuals in the event that a friend or family member tested positive for COVID-19. It allowed Big Tech companies (and potentially the governments) access to private medical data. The contact tracing supposedly helped “governments and health agencies reduce the spread of the virus, with user privacy and security central to the design,” according to an Apple announcement.

8. Reclaim The Net reported that recent documents claim the FBI monitored Project Veritas undercover journalism outlet. This included secret orders to Apple Google and Microsoft. Secret orders from the courts were directed to tech giants Apple, Google, and Microsoft in order to access private Project Veritas accounts. The report states that FBI search warrants had been issued against Project Veritas employees to target private accounts.

Conservatives being attacked. Your representatives should be contacted to insist that Big Tech be held responsible for ensuring the First Amendment is mirrored and conservatives are treated equally. If you have been censored, contact us using CensorTrack’s Use the contact formPlease help us make Big Tech more accountable.