SYDNEY – Almost eight in 10 Australians (79 percent) support monitoring publicly available information on social media to detect possible terrorist activity, and 68 percent support such monitoring to identify public issues according to a new Unisys survey.

Ho wever, 68 percent are not comfortable with organisations using social media monitoring to make targeted advertising or offers.The Unisys Security Insights report claims that a

majority of Australians support monitoring social media such as Twitter,

Facebook and YouTube to detect possible terrorist activity and to identify

public issues for the “the greater good” – but not if it is for commercial

gain.

“The use of social media by terrorists has been widely reported and has clearly

had an impact on the Australian public’s acceptance of the need for authorities

to monitor these channels for public safety and national security purposes,”

says John Kendall, security program director at Unisys Asia Pacific.

“However, Australians clearly take into account the objectives of such

monitoring to discern whether it is acceptable.

“There is moderate support to monitor social media to track an organisation’s

performance or to evaluate job candidates in positions of trust such as carers

or teachers. But there is very little support – only 27 percent approval – for

using this information for marketing.”