Author’s note: Feel free to copy/use/remix/reblog/Tumbl/tweet/steal any part of this post. It was a right pain in the ass to pull out the hundreds of terms from their PDFs, so take them as you will. There’s no need to have another person spend their time doing so.

By now you have likely seen reports that contain news of the list of terms the Department of Homeland Security searches for online, as it tracks what people are saying around the Internet. The list is extremely long, vague, and often quite humorous (even in the face of its importance).

As the Daily Mail notes, the Department of Homeland Security was forced to release the list, along with its entire Analyst’s Desktop Binder, following a Freedom of Information Act request. Essentially, the list is what the government is looking for online, hoping to spot threats, events, and other such things that would be of interest to the sprawling agency. The Mails report states that the Department has made the claim that the list is not used to search “the internet for disparaging remarks about the government [or] signs of general dissent.”

However, the list is worrisome all the same. The broadness of the terms that are being used as a starting point for tracking online communications is disconcerting; these are the words that could flag a person or conversation as potentially a threat to the United States. And thus, to have terms that come up in the daily news, and normal conversation, marked as worthy of tracking, is unsettling.

Here’s how the Binder describes the terms, and how they are to be used [Bracketed information via TNW]:

This is a current list of terms that will be used by the NOC [National Operations Center] when monitoring social media sites to provide situational awareness and establish a common operating picture. As natural or manmade disasters occur, new terms may be added. The new search terms will not use PII [Personally Identifiable Information] in searching for relevant mission-related information.

I’m going to attempt to summarize quite a bit of dense government policy in the next few paragraphs. Please don’t take my word for it. Pages 24 and 25 of the Binder have all that you need to know. However, it’s my job to gist and explain, so off we go.

What It All Means

There exist privacy controls in the Binder’s policies, but they can be overridden, whenever it is deemed required. As the Binder states, “Generally, both MMC and SN must never send out any IOIs with PII included except in“extremis situations”. An extremis situation occurs when there is an imminent threat of loss of life, serious bodily harm, or damage/destruction to critical facilities or equipment.” Even then, the disclosure of the information has to be approved by a Department of Homeland Security higher-up.

For the record, here are the big ‘no-nos’ of what MMC reports can’t have in the way of PII [Formatting adaptations: TNW]:

The following are cases in which PII must be removed from all MMC reports:

1. Names, positions, or other information that would enable someone to determine the identity of a particular persona. The Privacy Impact Assessment (PIA) allows for certain exemptions in which PII [Personally Identifiable Information] may be included to identify spokesmen, government officials and reporters. Note: Refer to section 3.1 and the current PIA for more information 2. Names of known or suspected terrorists, DTO leaders, or other individuals who are a threat to homeland security, regardless of whether a U.S. citizen or non-U.S. citizen 3. Links to the actual articles or postings referenced provided the links themselves do not contain PII. In this case the analyst would use “No Link Due To PII” instead of the actual link. 4. Addresses that would reveal where a person lives. In this case the analyst would either delete the street address completely generalize it to the street block. Example: instead of using “1345 John Doe Avenue”, the analyst could use “the 1300 block of John Doe Avenue”

So, the average person will essentially have any identifying information removed from any MMC that they are a part of, provided that it doesn’t ring massive alarm bells somewhere. In theory, you’re alright writing that paper about the use of dirty nuclear pipe bombs to disrupt domestic security, and national security, while causing an emergency. However, that’s just the start.

What is critical to this issue is who isn’t covered by the PII-exclusion requirements. Such exceptions include anyone (US citizen or not) in “situations involving potential life or death circumstances.” Or, any government official that has gone on the record, US or foreign. Also, terrorists and other such vermin. Those are hardly surprising, I think.

Here’s how the Binder describes the Department’s right to collect and report on their private information:

Furthermore, PII on the following categories of individuals may be collected when it lends credibility to the report or facilitates coordination with federal, state, local, tribal,territorial, foreign, or international government partners.

There is one last group listed, the description of which comically vague, and troubling. Here’s another slice of the population that can be tracked, and their private information shared in reports:

“Names of anchors, newscasters, or on-scene reporters who are known or identified as reporters in their post or article or who use traditional and/or social media in real time to keep their audience situationally aware and informed.”

Therefore, anyone in the media, period, doesn’t have the right to have their private information kept secret by the Department of Homeland Security. Woah. Scarier is how broad this is – anyone who uses social media to update others, and is merely ‘known’ as perhaps being a ‘reporter’ has no right to their PII being kept secret. In other words, if you are online, and comment on the news to an audience, you are essentially absolving the Department of Homeland Security from the need of redacting your private information, including “1) full name; 2) affiliation; 3) position or title; and 3) publicly-available user ID.”

I’m certainly not trying to be overly paranoid or tin-hatted, but the rules on how PII can be distributed for the above listed groups sounds quite like this: ‘if you fall into any of these categories, we are going to use any information about you that we can in any level of government, foreign or domestic.’ And that, if you are but an active user of social media that happens to be talking about an issue that is on their list of terms, you just may fall into the group. Now, to the list.

The following list of terms is directly taken from the Binder. Again, I had to strip them out, clean the text, and them format it, so please just take the list. Don’t do all that tedious work all over again. This post is for anyone. Educate people. Here you go:

The List

Domestic Security

Assassination

Attack

Domestic security

Drill

Exercise

Cops

Law enforcement

Authorities

Disaster assistance

Disaster management

DNDO (Domestic Nuclear Detection Office)

National preparedness

Mitigation

Prevention

Response

Recovery

Dirty bomb

Domestic nuclear detection

Emergency management

Emergency response

First responder

Homeland security

Maritime domain awareness (MDA)

National preparedness initiative

Militia

Shooting

Shots fired

Evacuation

Deaths

Hostage

Explosion (explosive)

Police

Disaster medical assistance team (DMAT)

Organized crime

Gangs

National security

State of emergency

Security

Breach

Threat

Standoff

SWAT

Screening

Lockdown

Bomb (squad or threat)

Crash

Looting

Riot

Emergency Landing

Pipe bomb Incident Facility

HAZMAT & Nuclear

Hazmat

Nuclear

Chemical spill

Suspicious package/device

Toxic National laboratory

Nuclear facility

Nuclear threat

Cloud

Plume

Radiation

Radioactive Leak

Biological infection (or event)

Chemical

Chemical burn

Biological Epidemic

Hazardous

Hazardous material incident

Industrial spill

Infection Powder (white)

Gas Spillover

Anthrax

Blister agent

Chemical agent

Exposure Burn

Nerve agent

Ricin

Sarin

North Korea

Health Concern + H1N1

Outbreak

Contamination

Exposure

Virus

Evacuation

Bacteria

Recall

Ebola

Food Poisoning

Foot and Mouth (FMD)

H5N1

Avian Flu

Salmonella

Small Pox

Plague

Human to human

Human to Animal

Influenza

Center for Disease Control (CDC)

Drug Administration (FDA)

Public Health

Toxic

Agro Terror

Tuberculosis (TB)

Agriculture

Listeria

Symptoms

Mutation Resistant

Antiviral Wave

Pandemic

Infection

Water/air-borne

Sick

Swine

Pork

Strain

Quarantine

H1N1 Vaccine

Tamiflu

Norvo

Virus

Epidemic

World Health Organization (WHO) (and components)

Viral

Hemorrhagic

Fever

E. Coli

Infrastructure Security

Infrastructure security

Airport

Airplane (and derivatives)

Chemical fire

CIKR (Critical Infrastructure& Key Resources)

AMTRAK

Collapse

Computer infrastructure

Communications infrastructure

Telecommunications

Critical infrastructure

National infrastructure

Metro

WMATA

Subway

BART

MARTA

Port Authority

NBIC (National Biosurveillance Integration Center)

Transportation security

Grid

Power

SmartBody scanner

Electric

Failure or outage

Black out

Brown out

Port

Dock

Bridge

Cancelled

Delays

Service disruption

Power lines

Southwest Border Violence

Drug cartel

Violence

Gang

Drug

Narcotics

Cocaine

Marijuana

Heroin

Border

Mexico

Cartel

Southwest

Juarez

Sinaloa

Tijuana

Torreon

Yuma

Tucson

Decapitated

U.S. Consulate

Consular

El Paso

Fort Hancock

San Diego

Ciudad Juarez

Nogales

Sonora

Colombia

Mara salvatrucha

MS13 or MS-13

Drug war

Mexican army

Methamphetamine

Cartel de Golfo

Gulf Cartel

La Familia

Reynosa

Nuevo

Leon

Narcos

Narco banners (Spanish equivalents)

Los Zetas

Shootout

Execution

Gunfight

Trafficking

Kidnap

Calderon Reyosa

Bust

Tamaulipas

Meth Lab

Drug trade

Illegal immigrants

Smuggling (smugglers)

Matamoros

Michoacana

Guzman

Arellano-Felix

Beltran-Leyva

Barrio

Azteca

Artistic

Assassins

Mexicles

New Federation

Terrorism

Terrorism

Al Qaeda (all spellings)

Terror

Attack

Iraq

Afghanistan

Iran

Pakistan

Agro

Environmental terrorist

Eco terrorism

Conventional weapon

Target

Weapons grade

Dirty bomb

Enriched

Nuclear

Chemical weapon

Biological weapon

Ammonium nitrate

Improvised explosive device IED (Improvised Explosive Device)

Abu Sayyaf

Hamas

FARC (Armed Revolutionary Forces Colombia)

IRA (Irish Republican Army)

ETA (Euskadi ta Askatasuna)

Basque

Separatists

Hezbollah

Tamil Tigers

PLF (Palestine Liberation Front)

PLO (Palestine Liberation Organization)

Car bomb

Jihad

Taliban

Weapons cache

Suicide bomber

Suicide attack

Suspicious substance

AQAP (AL Qaeda Arabian Peninsula)

AQIM (Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb)

TTP (Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan)

Yemen

Pirates

Extremism

Somalia

Nigeria

Radicals

Al-Shabaab

Home grown

Plot

Nationalist

Recruitment

Fundamentalism

Islamist

Weather/Disaster/Emergency

Emergency

Hurricane

Tornado

Twister

Tsunami

Earthquake

Tremor

Flood

Storm

Crest

Temblor

Extreme weather

Forest fire

Brush fire

Ice

Stranded/Stuck

Help

Hail

Wildfire

Tsunami

Warning Center

Magnitude

Avalanche

Typhoon

Shelter-in-place

Disaster

Snow

Blizzard

Sleet

Mud slide or Mudslide

Erosion

Power outage

Brown out

Warning

Watch

Lightening

Aid

Relief

Closure

Interstate

Burst

Emergency Broadcast System

Cyber Security

Cyber security

Botnet

DDOS (dedicated denial of service)

Denial of service

Malware

Virus

Trojan

Keylogger

Cyber

Command

2600

Spammer

Phishing

Rootkit

Phreaking

Cain and abel

Brute forcing

Mysql injection

Cyber attack

Cyber terror

Hacker

China

Conficker

Worm

Scammers

Social media

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