Pennsylvania police ordered to share social media tactics

The Pennsylvania State Police must publicize its policies for how it monitors social media during investigations, the state Supreme Court ruled Tuesday. The American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania tweeted that it fought to obtain the policy for six years. Police had previously given the ACLU a severely redacted version of its policies.

Why didn’t the police want to publicize this policy? The state police force argued that releasing the policy would compromise public safety. The Pennsylvania Office of Open Records conducted a review disagreeing with that position, saying that publicizing the full, unredacted version of the social media policies likely would not harm the effectiveness of investigations.

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