Agencies stay watchful amid social-media fervor

Hyper-vigilance on the inside and the outside seems to continue as the watchword for government attitudes toward social media.

For example, should you happen to say anything about the Food and Drug Administration in a social media context, the agency wants to know about it.

According to a solicitation recently posted on FedBizOpps.gov, FDA is looking to acquire "a social media monitoring service to provide metrics and in-depth tracking of mentions of the FDA in any website/blog/micro-blog or online publication." It explains that the data will help assess the reach of FDA messaging and its effectiveness, in order "to get a pulse on how FDA is faring online."

FDA is looking for a hosted solution, for a minimum one-year contract that will provide comprehensive coverage, social media metrics, data filtering and segmentation, workflow management, social media web analytics, social CRM and engagement, automated sentiment analysis, historical data, and enterprise-level scalability.

But a recent post on the Air Force website should serve a reminder that agencies also wants their workers to police themselves. Airmen should consider "the risks and vulnerabilities" associated with revealing personally identifiable information on Web 2.0 platforms, the post states.

"We're starting to see a loss of sensitive information occurring at an alarming rate," said Ryan McCausland, of the service's information protection directorate, in the Air Force article. "We must all continually safeguard our personal information as well as the information we handle in the workplace."

Among the restricted items mentioned in the Air Force post are biographies, rosters, telephone directories and organizational lists. The message of the Air Force post echoes a recent informal announcement by the National Guard Bureau.

For more:
- see the FedBizOpps.gov solicitation
- see the Air Force public affairs post

Related Articles:
National Guard Bureau advises on social media, avoids official policy
GAO: Agencies need social media guidance
@emergency_services: #sendhelp when 911 is down
FDA slaps Novartis for drug Facebook page