By Aaron Brantly, Director Tech4Humanity Lab
The U.S. election is over, and Americans voted for Donald Trump to take the reins of the country for the next four years. President Trump’s election has implications for policy areas ranging from immigration to the environment and nearly everything in between. Yet one area that will impact everyone nationally will be the relationship between security in online and offline spaces. The United States appears to be rapidly moving towards a model in which there are aligned and opposition media and social media outlets. Moreover, President-elect Trump has expressed a consistent desire to undermine the freedom of the press, to greatly expand libel laws, and to weaponize the tools of the state against those who might speak against him.
The rhetoric espoused by Trump is not new. Rather, the same rhetoric has been used time and again in states that have descended into authoritarianism. Vladimir Putin targeted his press with the security services, selective enforcement of tax laws, the creation of new laws, and eventually targeted assassinations of journalists. Russia eventually forced the sale or closure of nearly all opposition media outlets, passed laws requiring foreign NGOs to register as Foreign Agents, and more recently outlawed speech that goes against the official government line.
The consolidation of the media environment in the Russian Federation took place over a period of 20 years. International observers and NGOs watched as President Putin, with assistance from the Duma (Russia’s Parliament), slowly consolidated the information sphere. Russia’s path towards information control is possibly a model for the incoming Trump administration. Donald Trump’s frequent praising of Vladimir Putin will likely shape how the new administration sees the role of the state in the information environment.
The United States is on the verge of a substantial democratic decline that will likely be marked by the rise of opposition and regime media spheres. Fox News, One America News Network, Right Side Broadcasting Network, and others are likely to form the core of the incoming regime’s traditional media infrastructure. Networks as diverse as NBC, CNN, ABC, CBS, and newspapers ranging from the Washington Post and New York Times to the LA Times and the Chicago Tribune are likely to form the opposition news sphere. During the first Trump administration, the White House began limiting access to certain news outlets. The control of information is likely to tighten substantially in the coming months, and it will likely manifest first in selected provision of press credentials. The restriction of access is likely to be paired with direct verbal attacks against defined “opposition” media outlets. Eventually, it is likely we will see the use of new laws passed through a compliant Congress to target media outlets with charges ranging from libel to tax evasion. How fast all these events will transpire is unknown. Where the infrastructure has been laid, these changes might occur quickly. Frequently, new laws will need to be enacted, and existing members of the civil service will need to be replaced with “loyal” bureaucrats. These latter two processes are likely to take longer and delay the consolidation of the information environment.
The reality is that over the last 6-8 months, there has been an increasingly close relationship between Donald Trump and Elon Musk. This relationship pairs the power of the state with that of one of the largest social media networks, “X.” Trump is himself a major stockholder in a social media network, Truth Social. While both social networks are smaller in size than comparable networks such as Meta’s Facebook, Instagram, Threads, and WhatsApp, the proximity of the President to both media and social media infrastructures is largely unparalleled in modern American history.
Articulating the problem more clearly, the President-elect has a disdain for freedom of speech, has significant sway over an ideologically aligned media sphere, and control or close allies that control two large social networks with broad reach within society. This alone would constitute a problem, yet when these facts are paired with the power over the Department of Justice, the appointment of an ideologically aligned judiciary, and control over the domestic and foreign intelligence infrastructure of the state, the mixture sets up a potential for extreme forms of abuse. Sadly, this story has played out before in other countries in recent years to varying degrees. The process of shifting from a free press to a regime-controlled information environment is not identical across cases, yet the general language and processes that move towards consolidation of information environments are remarkably consistent.
As individuals and communities prepare for the changes from the incoming administration, it will become increasingly important to consider the privacy and security implications of using different social media platforms. As consolidation of the media environment begins to occur, it will
be increasingly important for users of social media, online communications platforms, and related networked communications technologies to more fully understand who owns a given platform, what the privacy policies of that platform are, what data is collected on platforms, to whom that data is sold, and more. The digital footprint of most journalists, activists, and academics is quite large. Yet these footprints will increasingly constitute a liability for public figures not aligned ideologically with the ruling regime. This will create a tension that has played out among public figures in other states with consolidating information spheres.
There will be an increasing tension between individual privacy and security and professional, moral, and ethical responsibilities. The tension will not be identical across all groups or individuals. Some individuals may remove themselves entirely from social media, while others will increasingly self-censor. As the consolidation or weaponization of the information sphere increases, both practices will arise with increasing frequency. Pressure on public figures will come not only from the government on individuals but will also arise from corporate, academic, NGO, or board leadership who seek to maintain funding within an increasingly contentious political environment. While individuals might be risk tolerant, the organizations in which they work are likely to be increasingly risk averse.
As the Director of the Tech4Humanity Lab at Virginia Tech I will be committing our lab to continuing its exploration of the intersection of technology and the human condition. While much of our research to date has focused on censorship and surveillance abroad, we will increasingly turn our gaze domestically. We will explore issues of privacy and security within the American context and attempt to provide insights where possible. We will also be working over the coming months to revamp our resources page to include information on best practices for academic research under conditions of regime hostility. We will also be working towards scheduling digital security for academics trainings and workshops in the coming months.
Ten initial top-line tips for everyone online:
1. Use two-factor authentication
2. Understand privacy policies See: (Terms of Service Didn’t Read)
3. Implement privacy protections on social media accounts
4. Encrypt your data
5. Update your computers and devices regularly when new updates become available.
6. Do not click on links in emails or text messages
7. Do not share location data on social media accounts or feeds.
8. Consider using a service like DuckDuckGo to anonymize your searches
9. Consider using a VPN
10. Use a passcode on your phone
As our lab gears up to address the coming challenges, here are some resources:
The Tor Project: https://www.torproject.org
Tor is a free overlay network for enabling anonymous communication. Built on free and open-source software and more than seven thousand volunteer-operated relays worldwide, users can have their Internet traffic routed via a random path through the network.
Psiphon: https://psiphon.ca
Psiphon is a free and open-source Internet censorship circumvention tool that uses a combination of secure communication and obfuscation technologies, such as a VPN, SSH, and a Web proxy.
Consumer Reports Security Planner: https://securityplanner.consumerreports.org
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