The impact of polices on government social media usage: Issues, challenges,

and recommendations
John Carlo Bertot, Paul T. Jaeger , Derek Hansen
College of Information Studies, University of Maryland, USA
a b s t r a c t a r t i c l e i n f o
Available online 3 November 2011
Keywords:
E-government
Social media
Policy
Access
Inclusion
Government agencies are increasingly using social media to connect with those they serve. These connec-
tions have the potential to extend government services, solicit new ideas, and improve decision-making
and problem-solving. However, interacting via social media introduces new challenges related to privacy,
security, data management, accessibility, social inclusion, governance, and other information policy issues.
The rapid adoption of social media by the population and government agencies has outpaced the regulatory
framework related to information, although the guiding principles behind many regulations are still rele-
vant. This paper examines the existing regulatory framework and the ways in which it applies to social
media use by the U.S. federal government, highlighting opportunities and challenges agencies face in imple-
menting them, as well as possible approaches for addressing these challenges.
2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
1. Social media and government
Social media refers to a set of online tools that are designed for
and centered around social interaction. In practice, social media serves
as a catchall phrase for a conglomeration of web-based technologies
and services such as blogs, microblogs (i.e., Twitter), social sharing
services (e.g., YouTube, Flickr, StumbleUpon, Last.fm), text messag-
ing, discussion forums, collaborative editing tools (e.g., wikis), virtual
worlds (e.g., SecondLife), and social networking services (e.g. Facebook,
MySpace) (Hansen, Shneiderman, & Smith, 2011). These tools vary dra-
matically in their purposes and approaches, but they share an emphasis
on enabling users to communicate, interact, edit, and share content in a
social environment (Porter, 2008; Tepper, 2003). Unlike traditional
media, social media relies on user-generated content, which refers to
any content that has been created by end users or the general public
as opposed to professionals. Traditional media such as radio, books,
and network television is primarily designed to be a broadcast platform
(one-to-many), whereas social media is designed to be a dialogue
(many-to-many interaction) (Porter, 2008). This many-to-many inter-
action allows large groups of geographically dispersed users to produce
valuable information resources (Benkler, 2002), solve challenging
problems by tapping into unique and rare expertise (Brabham, 2008),
and gain diverse insights and perspectives through discussion.
While the term social media is relatively new, the idea of using
online tools to facilitate social interaction across time and space
has been with us for decades in the form of email lists, Usenet, and
Bulletin Boards. These early forms of social media showed that sur-
prisingly rich social worlds with their own unique cultures can
emerge through something as simple as text-based conversations
with strangers (Burnett & Bonnici, 2003; Burnett & Buerkle, 2004;
Smith & Kollock, 1999), particularly if those conversations can be
overheard by others (Hansen, 2009). Over time a range of new social
media services have emerged, each with its own unique architecture
that shapes the types of interactions that can occur (Lessig, 2006), as
well as the way user-contributed data is managed. Services differ in
their scope, the pace of interaction, the type of content being shared
(e.g., videos, images, text), who can control the data, the types of
connections between users and items, and data retention policies
(Hansen et al., 2011). Indeed, small changes in the design of social
media tools and policies around them can be vital to their success
and failure (Maloney-Krichmar & Preece, 2005; Preece, 2000). Despite
these differences, this paper focuses on social media as a group because
many of the regulations that affect one tool also affect other tools.
Social media technologies are nowregularly employed by a majority
of internet users. Among younger users, the use of these tools is nearing
universal, such as 86% of 1829 year olds using social media everyday
(Madden, 2010). Similarly, 72% of adults and 87% of teens use text
messages everyday (Lenhart, 2010). In July 2010, Facebook announced
that it had over 500 million users. As the number of users has increased
there has been a growing interest in applying social media toward
addressing national priorities (Pirolli, Preece, & Shneiderman, 2010),
not just using them for entertainment or corporate purposes.
President Obama became a strong advocate for the use of social
media when he was presidential candidate Obama. A great deal of
fundraising and organizing success of the Obama presidential campaign
Government Information Quarterly 29 (2012) 3040
Corresponding author at: 4105 Hornbake Building, College of Information Studies,
University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742-4345, USA. Fax: +1 301 314 9145.
E-mail addresses: jbertot@umd.edu (J.C. Bertot), pjaeger@umd.edu (P.T. Jaeger),
dhansen@umd.edu (D. Hansen).
0740-624X/$ see front matter 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.giq.2011.04.004
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was tied directly to the extensive use of social media by the campaign
(Jaeger, Paquette, & Simmons, 2010). Both at the behest of the Obama
administration and as a natural outgrowth of the frequent use of
social media by individuals, federal government agencies have en-
thusiastically embraced the use of social media for government
purposes.
Government employment of social media offers several key op-
portunities for the technology (Bertot, Jaeger, Munson, & Glaisyer,
2010):
Democratic participation and engagement, using social media tech-
nologies to engage the public in government fostering participatory
dialogue and providing a voice in discussions of policy development
and implementation.
Co-production, in which governments and the public jointly develop,
design, and deliver government services to improve service quality,
delivery, and responsiveness.
Crowdsourcing solutions and innovations, seeking innovation through
public knowledge and talent to develop innovative solutions to large-
scale societal issues. To facilitate crowdsourcing, the government
shares data and other inputs so that the public has a foundational
base on which to innovate.
Though not mutually exclusive, these opportunities offer great
promise and pose new challenges in redening government-
community connections and interactions. As government social media
initiatives are launched and evaluated, design lessons can be extracted
and shared to achieve these and related goals (e.g., Johnston & Hansen,
in press).
Much government activity is now focused on social media, with so-
cial media becoming a central component of e-government in a very
short period of time (Bertot, Jaeger, & Grimes, 2010a, 2010b, in press;
Bertot, Jaeger, Munson, & Glaisyer, 2010; Chang & Kannan, 2008;
Drapeau & Wells, 2009; Noveck, 2008; Osimo, 2008; Snyder, 2009). U.S.
federal agencies have been using blogs, microblogs, wikis, and social
networking sites (Godwin, 2008; Laris, 2009), and even virtual worlds
(Miller, 2009), among other social media, to create records,
disseminate information, communicate with the public and between
agencies for several years (Barr, 2008; Hanson, 2008; Snyder, 2009;
Wyld, 2008). The General Services Administration has even created a
standard agreement for social media providers to allowfor government
usage of social media services. The Obama administration has made a
priority of the use of social media technologies, and the new Federal
Chief Information Ofcer is strongly encouraging the expansion of
these activities (Lipowicz, 2009; Thibodeau, 2009).
Not only is the Obama administration strongly encouraging agen-
cies to use social media to provide information, communicate with
members of the public, and distribute services, it has also made a
priority of public usage of social media to participate in government
(Jaeger & Bertot, 2010; Jaeger, Paquette, & Simmons, 2010). And
many members of the public already expect that government ser-
vices will be available electronically and that government agencies
will be accessible via social media technologies (Jaeger & Bertot,
2010). The widespread adoption of these social media tools has
been emphasized in a number of different White House reports,
such as the 2009 report entitled Open Government: A Progress Report
to the America People, which discuss how social media is being used
by agencies to promote transparency.
Though agencies are increasing their use of social media technolo-
gies as a way to extend government services, further reach individ-
uals, offer government information, and engage members of the
public in government efforts, agencies are in large part doing so
through an antiquated policy structure that establishes the parame-
ters for information ows, access, and dissemination. The next section
of the paper discusses this policy environment as it applies to social
media technologies.
2. Government social media usage and the law
Federal information policies can come from a large number of
sources, including legislation, regulations as contained in the Code
of Federal Regulations, directives (such as the Open Government
Directive issued by the Ofce of Management and Budget, which
mandated that agencies create an open government plan), Circu-
lars, and Executive Orders. Though there is a range of reasons why
these policies exist, information policies primarily govern issues of
safety, trust, security, ownership rights, social inclusion, participa-
tion, and record keeping. Within these broader topics are critical
areas related to privacy, e-participation and democratization, access,
and engagement.
Table 1 presents selected policies and their requirements as they
impact federal agency use of social media in terms of three key policy
objectives. While these policy instruments predominantly predate
the existence of social media, their reach extends to agency interac-
tion with and use of social media technologies. And yet, agencies
largely do not consider these policy instruments when using social
media. In many cases, the social media technologies have been imple-
mented without regard even to the policy goals in Table 1. In April
2010, the Ofce of Management and Budget (OMB) issued a memoran-
dum on social media, Web-based interactive technologies, and paper-
work reduction. The memo focused on agency use of social media in
relation to the requirements of the Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA),
trying to ensure that agencies complied with the requirements of the
PRA, which are detailed below. However, major policy goals of access,
inclusion, privacy, security, accuracy, archiving, and copyright have
yet to be addressed. The relationships of these policies to social media
are explored below in light of each of the policy goals. Appendix A
provides a detailed description of many of the policies related to
social media usage by government.
2.1. Access and social inclusion
For government use of social media to increase access to govern-
ment information and services and to successfully facilitate civic par-
ticipation, members of the public must be able to access and use
Table 1
Selected information policies by objective.
Policy objectives related
to social media
Selected relevant policy instruments
Access and
social inclusion
Americans with Disabilities Act
Executive Order 13166Improving Access to Services
for Persons with Limited English Prociency
Individuals with Disabilities Education Act
Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act
Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act
Telecommunications Act of 1996
Privacy, security,
accuracy, and archiving
Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA)
Federal Information Security Management Act
(FISMA)
Information Quality Act
OMB Memo M-03-22 (Guidance for Implementing
the Provisions of the E-government Act of 2002)
OMB Memo M-04-04 (E-Authentication Guidance for
Federal Agencies)
OMB Memo M-05-04 (Policies for Federal Agency
Websites)
Federal Depository Library Program (Title 44 USC)
Governing and
governance
E-government Act of 2002
OMB Circular A-130 (Management of Federal
Information Resources)
Paperwork Reduction Act
Various Copyright (Title 17 USC) and Patent &
Trademark (Title 35 USC) legislation
31 J.C. Bertot et al. / Government Information Quarterly 29 (2012) 3040
social media technologies. Several policy instruments are directly
related to access and inclusion in social media. And, the ability to
use social media technologies by the public is predicated on the fol-
lowing (Bertot, Jaeger, Munson, & Glaisyer, 2010):
1) Access to the technologies (which at a minimum necessitates a
device and internet access at a speed sufcient to support social
media content);
2) The development of technology, programs, and internet-enabled
services that offer equal access to all users; and,
3) Information and civics literacy necessary to understand govern-
ment services, resources, and operations.
For example, Executive Order 13166Improving Access to Services
for Persons with Limited English Prociency requires that agencies
provide appropriate access to persons with limited English pro-
ciency, encompassing all federally conducted programs and activi-
ties, including using social media technologies to communicate and
collaborate with members of the public. This policy objective is
meant to address the fact that there are highly pronounced gaps in
e-government usage among people who predominantly speak a
language other than English, as little e-government content is avail-
able in non-English formats; for example, 32% of Latinos who do not
speak English use the internet, but 78% of Latinos who speak English
use the internet (Fox & Livingston, 2007).
Many of these policies focus on access for people with disabilities,
as they are the most disadvantaged population in the United States in
relation to computer and internet access (Jaeger, 2011). Percentages
of computer and internet usage have remained at levels approxi-
mately less than half of the equivalent percentages for the rest of
the population since the advent of the Web (Dobransky & Hargittai,
2006; Jaeger, 2011; Lazar & Jaeger, 2011). Several of the instruments
that would seem to guarantee access to government use of social
media for persons with disabilities result from the broad protections
of disabilities rights laws. The Individuals with Disabilities Educa-
tion Act requires equal access to all electronic materials used in pub-
lic education. The Americans with Disabilities Act provides broad
prohibitions on the exclusion of persons with disabilities from gov-
ernment services and benets, including communication with the
government. Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act creates broad
standards of equal access to government activities and information
for individuals with disabilities, which includes content distributed
via social media, and establishes general rights to accessible infor-
mation and communication technologies, which includes social
media tools.
Other laws focus more directly on information and communica-
tion technology usage by the government. The Telecommunications
Act of 1996 promotes the development and implementation of acces-
sible information and communication technologies used online. Most
directly, Section 508 requires that electronic and information tech-
nologies purchased, maintained, or used by the federal government
meet certain accessibility standards designed to make online infor-
mation and services fully available to people with disabilities. Agen-
cies, as well as entities receiving federal funding, implementing social
media technology-based services must pay particular attention to
complying with the requirements of Section 508. Agencies employ-
ing non-Federal services to provide social media technology capabil-
ities are also required to ensure that persons with disabilities have
equivalent access to the information on these third party sites as
required in Section 508.
Social media companies rarely consider the accessibility require-
ments of Section 508, yet this inaccessibility has not been a deterrent
to the use of social media by government agencies. For persons with
disabilities, social media often means a reduced ability to participate.
For example, recent studies have found that the accessible version
of Facebook has fewer features and greatly reduced usability and
functionality, considerably limiting the utility and usefulness of the
site for users with disabilities (Lazar & Wentz, 2011; Wentz & Lazar,
2011). As many social media tools are inaccessible to people with
disabilities, and websites increasingly embed social media technolo-
gies within them, the accessibility of websites has steadily
decreased (Carlson, 2004; Harper & DeWaters, 2008). While future
technological developments may overcome such inaccessibility,
the current situation causes concern for inclusion of people with
disabilities in government use of social media.
2.2. Privacy, security, accuracy, and archiving
Social media technologies raise a large number of information
management issues, primarily in the areas of privacy, security, accu-
racy, and archiving, spanning major issues such as personally identi-
able information, security of government data and information,
and the accuracy of publicly available data. By adopting the use of
specic social media tools, government agencies appear to be tacitly
endorsing the privacy, security, and other policies employed by those
social media providers as adequate.
Some of the related policies are very specic and tailored to
the online environment. For example, the Children's Online Privacy
Protection Act (COPPA) prohibits the collection of individually iden-
tiable information from children under the age of 13. However, the
majority of related policy instruments address these issues in a
broad, non-specic fashion, which may include social media con-
texts within their broad scope. Overall, these policy instruments
address many issues of information management related to social
media, but fail to sufciently address at an operational level many
important issues of information management impacted by social
media.
OMB Memo M-04-04 (E-Authentication Guidance for Federal
Agencies) mandates that agencies decide the appropriate levels of
openness, moderation, authentication, and attribution, balancing
access, identity authentication, attribution, and concern for author-
itative sourcing in the level of moderation that is needed on an
agency website. To accomplish this, agencies must perform a stan-
dardized risk assessment on all applications they put online. Simi-
larly, the Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA)
requires a Certication and Accreditation (C&A) process for all
federal information technology systems that utilize social media
technologies. Further, this C&A activity must be performed by an
independent third party auditing team and must conform to the
Risk Management Framework of the National Institute of Standards
and Technology.
The Information Quality Act (passed into law in 2001) requires
agencies to maximize the quality, objectivity, utility, and integrity of
information and services provided to the public. The Act came into
effect prior to the development and use of prevailing social media
technologies; nonetheless, agencies must ensure reasonable suit-
able information and service quality strategies consistent with the
level of importance of the information that include clearly identify-
ing the limitations inherent in the information dissemination prod-
uct (e.g., possibility of errors, degree of reliability, and validity) and
taking reasonable steps to remove the limitations inherent in the
information.
Under OMB Memo M-03-22 (Guidance for Implementing the
Provisions of the E-government Act of 2002), federal public web-
sites, including those using social media technologies, are required
to conduct privacy impact assessments, post privacy policies in a
standardized machine-readable format on each website, and post a
Privacy Act Statement that describes the Agency's legal authority
for collecting personal data and how the data will be used. Addition-
ally, federal websites are prohibited from using persistent cookies
and other web tracking methods unless an Agency head or designated
Agency sub-head approved their use for a compelling need. In such
cases, agencies must post clear notice of the nature of the information
32 J.C. Bertot et al. / Government Information Quarterly 29 (2012) 3040
collectedinthe cookies, the purpose and use of the information, wheth-
er or not and to whom the information will be disclosed, and the
privacy safeguards applied to the information collected. The Privacy
Act did not envision a time in which people would be voluntarily
communicating with government agencies in digital open spaces
like Twitter.
When government websites become two-way communities, it
opens the possibility of virus and other attack agents being inserted
into the government environment, as well as the possibility of unin-
tended release of information. OMB Memo M-05-04 (Policies for
Federal Agency Websites) requires that agencies provide adequate
security controls to ensure information is resistant to tampering,
to preserve accuracy, to maintain condentiality as necessary, and
to ensure that the information or service is available as intended
by the Agency and as expected by users. This memo raises issues
in several different social media contexts. Many social media services
are hosted outside government websites (e.g., Facebook, Twitter,
YouTube). Under this memo, agencies are required to establish
and enforce explicit Agency-wide linking policies that set out
management controls for linking beyond the Agency to outside
services and websites. This memo establishes that providing dis-
claimers detailing the level of moderation found on third party
sites is appropriate on these notication screens, while pop-up or
intermediary screens should be used to notify users that they are
exiting a government website. Additionally, many social media
services allow users to take data from one website and combine
it with data fromanother, commonly referred to as mashups. According
to this memo, agency public websites are required, to the extent practi-
cable and necessary to achieve intended purposes, to provide all data in
an open, industry standard format that permits users to aggregate,
disaggregate, or otherwise manipulate and analyze the data to
meet their needs.
The presence of a related policy, however, does not guarantee the
application of a solution to an information management issue raised
by social media. For over 150 years, the Government Printing Ofce
(GPO) has served as the lead and coordinating agency in conjunction
with the Federal Depository Library Program (FDLP)a network of
nearly 150 full, partial, and regional Depositories. This collaborative
network has served as the primary means for providing community
access to government information. However, the ability of social
media to provide direct constituent and government interactions
raises major challenges for the comprehensive collection and dissem-
ination of government information. Digitization is transforming the
FDLP structure and the nature of government interactions with con-
stituents. As social media technologies are increasingly deployed by
government agencies, responsibility for codifying, disseminating, and
providing access to ofcial government information remains an
unanswered question (Jaeger, Bertot, & Shuler, 2010; Shuler, Jaeger, &
Bertot, 2010). While responsibilities for archiving social media interac-
tions remain unaddressed, much of this information disappears.
This situation also means that there decreasingly exists a perma-
nent and nal document, upon which nearly all records manage-
ment and archiving efforts are built (Bertot, Jaeger, Munson, & Glaisyer,
2010). By using third party applications and software that reside on
non-governmental information systems, data ownership, records sched-
ules, and archiving are signicant issues. To address these issues, agen-
cies could begin working in collaboration with the National Archives
and Records Administration (NARA), the GPO, and the FDLP libraries to
ensure the permanency of the public record regarding social media tech-
nologies. This will be particularly signicant as the policy making and
public comment process migrates increasingly to online venues.
2.3. Governing and governance
Policy instruments also establish the parameters of governing
and governance. These instruments provide broad principles and
guidance for agencies, but fail to address the use of social media, as
nearly all pre-date the development and use of social media technol-
ogies. Much of such guidance is encapsulated in OMB Circular A-130
and the PRA establish principles that:
Agencies are required to disseminate information to the public in a
timely, equitable, efcient, and appropriate manner.
Agencies are required to establish and maintain Information Dis-
semination Product Inventories.
Agencies must consider disparities of access and how those without
internet access will have access to important disseminations.
Agencies should develop alternative strategies to distribute
information.
When using electronic media, the regulations that govern proper
management and archiving of records still apply.
Agencies need to evaluate and determine the most appropriate
methods to capture and retain records on both government servers
and technologies hosted on non-Federal hosts.
Agencies are required to provide members of the public who do not
have internet connectivity with timely and equitable access to in-
formation, for example, by providing hard copies of reports and
forms.
When considering these principles in light of social media tech-
nologies, a range of issues surface, such as: the need for alternative
dissemination strategies for access to and dissemination of govern-
ment information and services; the need for ubiquitous access to
internet-embedded information content; and the need to consider
records management, archiving, and preservation. While social media
technologies have the potential to reach a large percentage of the pub-
lic, social media technologies can also exclude users without internet
access, including economically disadvantaged persons, from receiving
such information. Also, some social media technologies require high-
speed internet access and bandwidth, which may not be available in
rural areas or may be unaffordable.
The E-government Act of 2002 also established several related
standards for e-government that inform the use of social media by
government agencies, such as: developing priorities and schedules
for making government information available and accessible to the
public; posting inventories on agency websites; publishing annual
reports on inventories, priorities, and schedules; complying with
requirements of Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act in all online
activities; and implementing and maintaining an Information Dis-
semination Management System.
Though not exhaustive, the above sections demonstrated that
there is a substantial disconnect along several issue areas between
existing information policies and government use of social media
technologies. While one may argue that agencies should continue to
forge ahead with the adoption and use of social media due to their
ability to offer government services where individuals increasingly
are with their online usage, there is a need to update the information
policy context to better guide agenciesas well as set security, priva-
cy, and other parameterswith social media technologies.
3. Gaps in existing policy and attempts to address them
The unique nature of social media technologiesand the basis of
their mass appeal and strength as a government toollies in their
ability to create an immediate and interactive dialogue. But this na-
ture also creates important policy challenges as these technologies
continue to be used more extensively both by governments and the
public. Though the current policy environment addresses many issues
of privacy, security, accuracy, and archiving in some detail, much of
the policy related to the use of social media predates the creation of
social media technologies. As a result, many of the existing policies
do not adequately address the technological capacities, operations,
or functions of social media. Further, as social media provide new
33 J.C. Bertot et al. / Government Information Quarterly 29 (2012) 3040
ways to combine previously unavailable and/or separately maintained
data, there are now cross-dataset concerns that impact multiple policy
issues. Finally, it is important to consider that social media services
are private ventures with their own acceptable use, data use, acces-
sibility, and privacy policies that often do not conform to federal
requirements.
Consider the following issues related to social media that are par-
tially addressed or not addressed at all by current policy:
Ensuring information disseminated through social media is consis-
tently available;
Making information available through social media available in
other formats for those who lack equal access due to infrastructure,
ability, language, or literacy;
Maintaining consistency of access for government agencies and for
members of the public;
Archiving information disseminated through social media for per-
manent access and retrieval;
Preventing release of sensitive or secret information;
Fostering transparency and accountability, through which govern-
ment is open and transparent regarding its operations to build
trust and foster accountability;
Ensuring the security of personally identiable information;
Maintaining security of user information;
Providing a continuously updated data.gov registry, with an histor-
ical index that shows current and past data availability;
Ensuring that third-party social media technology providers (e.g.,
Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Second Life) adhere to government
privacy, security, and accuracy policies and requirements;
Ensuring that individual-government transactions that transpire
through social media technologies are condential, private, and/or
secure as required by federal laws and policies;
Ensuring continuity of service, especially when technologies sun-
set. For example, Yahoo announced the discontinuation of its de-
licious tagging service (http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/
rip_delicious_you_were_so_beautiful_to_me.php).
Ensuring that mashups and other forms of data integrationan in-
creasing activity due to data availability via data.govdo not lead
to user prole development that invades privacy or otherwise com-
promises individuals, national security, or agency data security;
Monitoring the storage of government information when held off-
site through cloud computing services. Allowing private companies
to maintain potentially sensitive government data raises enormous
questions of data retrieval, accuracy, and permanence, as well as
opens up signicant opportunities for misuse of data by providers
or attempts by other governments to access the data based on the
geographic location of the server farms where the data are main-
tained; and
Ensuring that social media technologies are not the only means of
getting a response from an agency.
This list is by no means exhaustive, and each type of social media
technology raises its own specic set of policy issues.
The Obama Administration is aware of and trying to address at
least some of these policy shortcomings. Since April 2010, OMB has
issued three signicant memos regarding Federal agency use of and
interaction with social media technologies: 1) M-10-22 (Guidance
for Online Use of Web Measurement and Customization Technolo-
gies); 2) M-10-23 (Guidance for Agency Use of Third-Party Websites
and Applications); and an unnumbered memo issued on April 7,
2010 by Cass Sunstein entitled Social Media, Web-Based Interactive
Technologies, and the Paperwork Reduction Act.
Memo M-10-22 (Guidance for Online Use of Web Measurement
and Customization Technologies) broadens the denition of tracking
technologies to now include all web measurement and customiza-
tion technologies, even going so far as to explicitly state that this
guidance is not limited to any specic technology or application
(such as persistent cookies). More signicantly, it explicitly promotes
the use of these measurement and customization technologies to
achieve some of the benets other sites that use them enjoy including
website analytics and customization of the user experience. This is
consistent with the other memos by the Obama administration
that emphasize the benets or perceived benets of enabling the
use of social media technologies. There are still prohibitions such
as tracking individual-level activity outside of the website, sharing
the data with other departments or agencies, and cross-referencing
the data with personally identiable information. To safeguard users,
notication of the ability to opt out or opt in must be provided, along
with additional information in the privacy policy. However, despite
the prohibitions and safeguards, the message of allowing these
technologies that are becoming increasingly important to social
media tools comes through clearly.
OMB Memo M-10-23 (Guidance for Agency Use of Third-Party
Websites and Applications) accounts for the increasing amount of
internet activity that occurs on third-party sites such as Facebook,
Twitter, YouTube, and other social media. Like OMB Memo M-10-
22, the focus is on protecting participants' privacy, but in the context
of third parties. While some earlier memos touched on websites
hosted by contractors or data held by third parties (e.g., M-03-22),
the default assumption was that government agencies were in com-
plete control of the content and data management activities on the
sites.
Government agencies interact via the internet in several ways
with third parties. As specic social media sites such as Facebook
have become important platforms for information exchange, govern-
ment agencies have created a presence on them. Agencies have also
begun including third party widgets, modules, snippets, and plug-
ins on their own websites. These are mini applications with dynamic
content or services that are embedded within another web page. Fi-
nally, many social media and related sites offer Application Pro-
gramming Interfaces (APIs) that allow other programs and sites to
call upon their content and services. These support mashups that
combine data from different sources into an integrated user experi-
ence, such as a Google Map that has user-generated content on
nursing homes overlaid onto it.
The content of OMB Memo M-10-23 builds on a number of exist-
ing policies. There is a strong emphasis on privacy policies, Privacy
Impact Assessments (PIAs), and the role of the Senior Agency Ofcial
for Privacy (SAOP), all of which were discussed in prior memos (e.g.,
M-03-22). These regulatory forms are all expanded upon in this
memo to specically deal with the new questions raised by agen-
cies' use of these new types of third party sites and services. For ex-
ample, agencies with a presence on third party sites must provide a
Privacy Notice, which is a brief description of how the agency's Pri-
vacy Policy will apply in a specic situation such as the use of a
third party site that has its own privacy policies. Finally, agencies
are still encouraged to link to or otherwise alert (e.g., through the
use of pop-up windows) users when they link to a third party website
that is not part of the government domain.
The Memorandum (Social Media, Web-Based Interactive Tech-
nologies, and the Paperwork Reduction Act) written by Cass Sun-
stein on April 7, 2010 claries when and how the Paperwork
Reduction Act of 1995 (the PRA) applies to Federal agency use of so-
cial media and web-based interactive technologies. The memoran-
dum's primary aim is to clarify that certain uses of social media
and web-based interactive technologies will be treated as equivalent
to activities that are currently excluded from the PRA. The memo is
needed because the vagueness of the original law that species that
the PRA applies to the collection of information regardless of form
or format, but does not dene information. Later OMB regulations
excluded three types of activities discussed in the memo that were
not considered information: general solicitations, public meetings,
and like items.
34 J.C. Bertot et al. / Government Information Quarterly 29 (2012) 3040
The memo discusses each of these three exclusions, explaining
how certain social media activities fall within them. For example:
The memo explains that the PRA does not apply if social media tools
are used to solicit general comments from the public (i.e., open-
ended responses to questions) rather than answers to specic
closed-ended survey questions under the general solicitations
exclusion.
The memo indicates that, through the public meetings exclusion,
most regular social media activity is exempt from the PRA since
OMB considers interactive meeting toolsincluding but not limit-
ed to public conference calls, webinars, blogs, discussion boards, fo-
rums, message boards, chat sessions, social networks, and online
communitiesto be equivalent to in-person public meetings.
The memo identies like items that are not information and
thus not covered by the PRA. These include: 1) email addresses,
usernames, passwords, and geographic locations gathered for ac-
count registration; 2) items collected to help navigate or customize
a website; 3) ratings and rankings; and 4) items necessary to com-
plete a voluntary commercial transaction, and contests, so long as
they do not take the form of structured responses.
Even with the guidance provided by OMB, however, there remain
a number of policy gaps in a range of areas. The area of access and in-
clusion provides a good example of how these different unanswered
questions in the policy environment can fail to address the ways in
which entire populations can be cut out of the use of social media
to interact with government. Technological developments often ben-
et the already-technologically privileged (Corbridge, 2007; Hanson,
2008; Mackenzie, 2010). Government use of social media seems to
favor access for those who already have access to other technological-
ly-based means of government interaction.
As discussed above, disabilities and language can be barriers to ac-
cess and usage of government social media services. These are not the
only groups in this position of potential disenfranchisement, however.
By shifting away fromwhat were more familiar and accessible methods
of information communication, and interaction, the use of social media
can also distance users with limited technological literacythe under-
standing of how to use technologies like computers and the internet.
As lower levels of technological literacy are generally linked to lower
levels of formal education and lower levels of ability to adapt to new
technologies, users with lower technological literacy may be intimidat-
ed or driven from participation by social media (Jaeger & Thompson,
2003, 2004; Powell, Byrne, & Dailey, 2010).
4. Future directions
None of these policy gaps or questions that need further investiga-
tion is presented as reasons for government to reduce or avoid the
use of social media. Indeed social media offers opportunities to pro-
vide newgovernment functions and to invigorate established govern-
ment functions, such as transparency (Bertot, Jaeger, & Grimes,
2010a, 2010b, in press). Instead, they are raised as issues to consider
and address as social media becomes an increasing central aspect of
presenting government information, connecting to government ser-
vices, and engaging members of the public in governance and civic
discourse.
While the role of social media technologies in government infor-
mation services is still coalescing, there is time to analyze and re-
search the standing of social media within the larger policy context
and the changes that are necessary in the policy environment to en-
sure the success of the new technology. Table 2 below presents a
set of policy and research questions related to the three key policy ob-
jectives discussed above, as well as two other essential areas for fu-
ture consideration in research and policy: Social Media Use and
New Democratic Models. These questions are not meant to be com-
prehensive, but instead to point to the range of important issues
that require further examination in relation to the government use
of social media.
Social media technologies are not the rst new technological devel-
opment that government agencies have adopted before consideration
of existing policy requirements and goals. The implementation of new
technologies tends to depoliticize change by technologizing it, thereby
muting questions of power, inequality, or exclusion (Mackenzie, 2010,
p. 183). Often, the quick adoption of new technologies has overridden
other concerns, such as the rapid, yet uncoordinated, implementation
of government agency websites that has resulted in the United States
government being the largest provider of content online, yet lacking a
uniform look or function to its sites the way that other governments
do. Similarly, the decade-plus struggles inthe adoption and deployment
of broadband nationally despite a series of interventions provide anoth-
er cautionary example for the implementation of social media without
adequate consideration of the overall policy context (Paquette, Jaeger,
& Wilson, 2010).
Bringing social media usage by government agencies in line with
existing policies is a rst essential step in the ongoing usage of social
media with other government goals. And these policies must be un-
derstood within the broader policy and information contexts, as the
government is more than an allocator of services and values; it is
an apparatus for assembling and managing the political information
associated with expressions of public will and with public policy
(Bimber, 2003, p. 17). The aforementioned recent memos issued by
OMB are a rst attempt to move the federal government's policies to-
wards encompassing social media technologies. But these memos are
incremental and do not address the larger policy modication needs.
To navigate the discrepancies between traditional information poli-
cies that govern government information ows, access, and interac-
tion, one suggested solution is a process of harmonization (Bertot,
Jaeger, Shuler, Simmons, & Grimes, 2009; Jaeger, Bertot, & Shuler,
2010; Shuler, Jaeger & Bertot, 2010). Though the concept of harmoni-
zation has been proposed as an approach for e-government informa-
tion generally, it can be especially useful within the context of social
media. Such harmonization should be based on using the long-estab-
lished core democratic principles such as:
Fostering an engaged and informed public. Embedded deeply with-
in the founding of the United States is access to government infor-
mation, beginning with the Declaration of Independence itself
and continuing through to e-government programs today (Jaeger
& Bertot, 2011). This principle has existed in particular through
more than 150 years through the Federal Depository Library Program
(FDLP), through which the federal government and over 1200 librar-
ies collaborate to provide access to and disseminate a wide range of
government information to ensure an informed public. Fundamental-
ly, it is essential for the public to have ready access to government in
order to participate in democratic activities.
Extending services and resources to where the public is. A key
aspect of the FDLP, the establishment of agency regional ofces,
courts, and other government outposts are mechanisms to
embed and make available federal government services at more
local levelsthereby putting government closer to people and
communities.
Participatory democracy. Our government includes a number of
means through which the public can participate in democratic ac-
tivitiestestimony at hearings, responses to regulation solicitations,
contacting and interacting with elected ofcials, to name a few. The
interaction between the public and government ensures that gov-
ernment remains of the people, for the people.
Transparency and openness. The requirement that government
make its information, data, and processes public and readily acces-
sible provides accountability, an enhanced ability of the public to
see into the workings of government, and the information to voice
concerns about these workings, when necessary.
35 J.C. Bertot et al. / Government Information Quarterly 29 (2012) 3040
Equity of access. A prevalent thread that weaves the nation's informa-
tion policies is ensuring that the public, regardless of socio-economic
status, geographic location, disability, availability of telecommunica-
tions technologies, or other factors that can contribute to gaps in
access to information.
Ensuring permanent access for an informed public. The archiving
of government information is designed to ensure permanent access
to the government recordregardless of how that information is
created, stored, or retrieved.
These principles stretch back to the foundation of the Republic, as
James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, and John Jay argued for these
concepts in the Federalist Papers (1789) with the vision of a constitu-
tional government would be the center of information in the new
nation. In fact, information and communication appear as important
concepts in 31 of the 85 essays in the Federalist Papers, with authors
believing that information would both help link people to the process of
governance and simultaneously prevent the formation of tyrannical
majorities. These same principles also serve as a starting point for the
harmonization process across the policies identied in this article.
In addition to utilizing a harmonization perspective to frame the
government use of social media, the existing policies outlined above
and detailed in Appendix A must receive greater attention in the
decisions by agencies to use social media technologies. In many
cases, the agencies may not even be aware of the range of related
policies and the implications of those policies. An important rst
step would be the creation of a guide that would provide clear guid-
ance to all agencies about the policies that must be considered in
the adoption and use of social media. GSA (2010) has created a so-
cial media handbook, but there is need for a cross-agency social
media guide specically devoted to the relevant policies and their
implications. Prior to proposing new policies to specically address
government use of social media, an explicit set of social media
guidelines that encompasses all existing policies would help to clar-
ify whether new policies are needed and what issues new policies
would need to address.
A further important step would be building on social media usage
as the impetus for examining the responsiveness of policy to techno-
logical change. For example, as agencies began adopting cloud com-
puting services several years ago, this adoption raised many issues
Table 2
Key policy and research questions related to social media and policy objectives.
Policy objectives related
to social media
Key policy and research questions
Social Media Use What tools and approaches best promote exchange between governments and users?
What mix of technologies, data, and information promote, support, and foster user engagement?
What technologies provide the best ways to display content to users for informed participation?
How can designers promote exposure to diverse viewpoints? What are individual preferences for opinion diversity in information access?
How can agencies best incorporate social media-produced feedback into policy and decision-making?
How can governments create sustainable social media technology strategies and efforts?
Access and social inclusion What tools and approaches best promote universal access to social media technologies?
How do we ensure that social media technologies are inclusive, rather than exclusive?
Are there social media technologies that can facilitate access to persons with disabilities?
What mechanisms (e.g., partnerships, collaborations) can promote access to and participation in social media technologies to all members of
society?
How can agencies leverage partnerships to extend social media applications and use within communities across the country?
What types of partnerships best promote use of and interaction with government through social media technologies?
How can agencies and organizations develop mutually benecial partnerships?
What organizational, management, and operational structures are necessary to create successful partnerships?
Privacy, security, accuracy,
and archiving
How will agencies ensure the privacy of individuals, particularly when data may not be owned by government agencies?
What data and information search tools are necessary to facilitate access to and location of government data?
What review processes are required prior to government data dissemination through open government initiatives such as data.gov to ensure
privacy, security, and accuracy?
What data validity, reliability, and quality check processes could be adopted in order to ensure appropriate uses, combinations, and
extrapolations of combined government (and other) datasets?
What cybersecurity measures, tools, and approaches are necessary to ensure national, agency, and individual security?
What tools and applications do agencies need to archive and preserve their social media-based activities?
What is the document that agencies preserve based on their social media activities?
What policies and procedures are necessary to govern the scheduling and archiving of government social media activities?
What is the role of GPO and the FDLP, if any, in the social media technology environment of the federal government?
Governing and governance How do we build social and political trust?
Who/what makes decisions on what authority?
What collaborative governance processes and structures do social media technologies enable?
What policy structures and frameworks are necessary to govern government use of and interaction with social media technologies?
In what ways can the federal government harmonize across a range of policy instruments to comprehensively account for the evolving policy
context of social media technologies?
How will social media technology change how policy is developed?
Will social media technology privilege certain types of policy substance over others?
Will social media technology result in new policies that rely on the existence of social media to be viable?
What policy barriers to using social media technologies exist, and how do we resolve those policy impediments?
How do we create policies that encourage the use of social media technologies?
How can agencies and governments incorporate the results of social media technology use into agency strategies, goals, objectives, services, and
resources?
What review and analysis processes should agencies develop to assess social media-based participatory feedback and solicitations into agency
workows?
New Democratic Models What do we mean by the term transforming democracy?
What possible scenarios both positive and negative can be envisaged?
What are the opportunities and limits on transformations that are compatible with the U.S. constitution, the precedents in the eld of
administrative law, political norms and traditions?
What are the limits or parts of our system that should be prioritized?
What transformations could solve problems with our existing structures, and where are the biggest benets to be had?
36 J.C. Bertot et al. / Government Information Quarterly 29 (2012) 3040
that policy wasand remainsunready to successfully address (Jaeger,
Lin, & Grimes, 2008; Jaeger, Lin, Grimes, & Simmons, 2009; Paquette,
Jaeger, & Wilson, 2010). When the adoption of new technologies by
government agencies challenges relevance of current information poli-
cy, it is a clear indicator that the policy development and renement
process is not eet enough for the current environment of rapid techno-
logical change that seems likely to continue into the foreseeable future.
As new technologies that are currently unimagined will continue to
emerge and be adopted by government agencies, the development of
more responsive information policies that are based on principles that
are not tied to specic technologies will be a vital step in ensuring
that policies can remain relevant and useful to government agencies
and members of the public.
Social media technologies have already taken an important place
among means of communication between government and members
of the public and are poised to continue to take on greater promi-
nence as a mechanism of government information and services are
more content moves onto this platform and more users come to ex-
pect to use social media as a primary method to interact with govern-
ment. At its best, social media has the potential to simultaneously
make government more reachable, available, and relevant to users,
while offering users more opportunities to become actively engaged
in government. To ensure that social media technologies enable
some or all of this lofty potential, the policy issues related to social
media must be closely examined and addressed while the uses of
the technologies are still developing and evolving.
Policy instrument Policy type Description
OMB Memo M-05-04 Memo When government websites become two-way communities, it opens the possibility of
viruses and other attack agents being inserted into the government environment. Many of
the security policies in OMB Memo M-05-04 have implications for Web 2.0 technologies:
Policies for Federal Agency Websites
Agencies are required to provide adequate security controls to ensure information is
resistant to tampering, to preserve accuracy, to maintain condentiality as necessary,
and to ensure that the information or service is available as intended by the Agency and
as expected by users.
Many social media services are hosted outside government websites (e.g., Facebook,
Twitter, YouTube):
Agencies are required to establish and enforce explicit Agency-wide linking
policies that set out management controls for linking beyond the Agency to outside
services and websites.
Disclaimers detailing the level of moderation found on third party sites are often
appropriate on these notication screens.
Pop-up or intermediary screens should be used to notify users that they are
exiting a government website.
Many social media services allow users to take data from one website and combine it
with data from another, commonly referred to as mashups:
Agency public websites are required, to the extent practicable and necessary to
achieve intended purposes, to provide all data in an open, industry standard format that
permits users to aggregate, disaggregate, or otherwise manipulate and analyze the data
to meet their needs.
Agencies need to ensure that these open industry standard formats are followed
to maximize the utility of their data.
OMB Memo M-04-04 Memo Agencies must decide the appropriate levels of openness, moderation,
authentication, and attribution that require a balance between access, identity
authentication, attribution, and concern for authoritative sourcing in the level of
moderation that is needed on a site.
E-Authentication Guidance for
Federal Agencies
Requires Agencies to perform a standardized risk assessment on all applications
they put online. The risk assessment also identies the Level of Assurance (LOA) of
identity the application should require from an end user's identity credential (userID/
password pair, digital certicate or other identity management technology).
OMB Memo M-10-22 Memo Federal public websites, including those using social media technologies, are
required to conduct privacy impact assessments, post privacy policies on each
website, post a Privacy Act Statement that describes the Agency's legal authority for
collecting personal data and how the data will be used.
Guidance for Online Use of Web Measurement
and Customization Technologies
Agencies must post privacy policies in a standardized machine-readable format
such as the Platform for Privacy Preferences Project.
Federal websites are prohibited from using persistent cookies and other web
tracking methods unless an Agency head or designated Agency sub-head approved
their use for a compelling need.
When approved, Agencies must post clear notice of the nature of the
information collected in the cookies, the purpose and use of the information, whether
or not and to whom the information will be disclosed, and the privacy safeguards
applied to the information collected.
OMB Memo M-10-23 Memo Agencies should provide individuals with alternatives to third-party social media
websites and applications. Guidance for Agency Use of Third-Party
Websites and Applications When linking to third-party websites agencies must alert (e.g., via a pop-up)
visitors that they are being directed to a nongovernment websites that may have
different privacy policies.
If an agency embeds a third-party application on its website the agency's privacy
policy should disclose the third-party's involvement.
Agencies using third-party websites or applications should use appropriate
branding to distinguish the agency's activities from those of nongovernment actors.
If data is collected via a third-party website or application, the agency should
collect only the information necessary for the proper performance of agency func-
tions and which has practical utility.
OMB Circular A-130 and Paperwork
Reduction Act
Circular/Law Agencies are required to disseminate information to the public in a timely,
equitable, efcient, and appropriate manner.
Appendix A. Descriptions of selected policy instruments related to government use of social media
(continued on next page)
37 J.C. Bertot et al. / Government Information Quarterly 29 (2012) 3040
(continued)
Policy instrument Policy type Description
Agencies are required to establish and maintain Information Dissemination
Product Inventories.
Agencies must consider disparities of access and how those without internet
access will have access to important disseminations.
Agencies should develop alternative strategies to distribute information alongside
any utilization of social media tools.
When using electronic media the regulations that govern proper management
and archival of records still apply.
Agencies need to evaluate their use of Web 2.0 technologies and determine the
most appropriate methods to capture and retain records on both government servers
and technologies hosted on non-Federal hosts.
Section 8 of A-130:
Agencies are required to provide members of the public who do not have internet
connectivity with timely and equitable access to information, for example, by
providing hard copies of reports and forms.
Using social media technologies as an exclusive channel for information
distribution would prevent users without internet access, including economically
disadvantaged persons, from receiving such information.
Also, some social media technologies require high-speed internet access and band-
width, which may not be available in rural areas or may be unaffordable.
Rehabilitation Act of 1973 Law Section 504:
Creates broad standards of equal access to government activities and information
for individuals with disabilities, which includes content distributed via social media.
Establishes general rights to accessible information and communication
technologies, which includes social media tools.
Section 508:
Requires that electronic and information technologies purchased, maintained, or
used by the Federal Government meet certain accessibility standards.
These standards are designed to make online information and services fully
available to the 54 million Americans who have disabilities.
Agencies, as well as entities receiving federal funding, implementing social
media technology-based services must pay particular attention to complying with
the requirements of Section 508.
Agencies employing non-Federal services to provide social media technology
capabilities are also required to ensure that persons with disabilities have equivalent
access to the information on these third party sites as required in Section 508.
Executive Order 13166Improving
Access to Services for Persons
with Limited English Prociency
Executive Order Requires that agencies provide appropriate access to persons with limited English
prociency:
Encompasses all federally conducted programs and activities. Anything an
Agency does, including using social media technologies to communicate and
collaborate with members of the public, falls under the reach of the mandate.
Agencies must determine how much information they need to provide in other
languages based on an assessment of customer needs.
Social media technologies are not different than any other technology used by
the Federal government.
E-government Act of 2002 Law Agencies are required to develop priorities and schedules for making government
information available and accessible to the public.
Inventories must be posted on Agency websites.
The annual E-Government Act report to OMB must contain information on the
nal inventories, priorities, and schedules.
Compels agencies to comply with requirements of Section 508 of the
Rehabilitation Act in all online activities.
Agencies are required to implement and maintain an Information Dissemination
Management System.
Information Quality Act Law Agencies are required to maximize the quality, objectivity, utility, and integrity of
information and services provided to the public.
In terms of social media technologies, agencies must ensure reasonable suitable
information and service quality strategies consistent with the level of importance of
the information that include
Clearly identifying the limitations inherent in the information dissemination
product (e.g., possibility of errors, degree of reliability, and validity);
Taking reasonable steps to remove the limitations inherent in the information;
and
Reconsider delivery of the information or services.
Federal Information Security
Management Act (FISMA)
Law Requires a Certication and Accreditation (C&A) process for all Federal IT systems
that utilize social media technologies.
C&A activity must be performed by an independent third party auditing team
and must conform to the Risk Management Framework of the National Institute of
Standards and Technology.
Children's Online Privacy Protection
Act (COPPA)
Law Prohibits collection of individually identiable information from children.
Denes child as under the age of 13.
FTC determines if a website is directed to children.
Individuals with Disabilities Education Act Law Requires equal access to all electronic materials used in public education.
Americans with Disabilities Act Law Created broad prohibitions on the exclusion of persons with disabilities from
government services and benets, including communication with the government.
Telecommunications Act of 1996 Law Promotes the development and implementation of accessible information and
communication technologies being used online.
Copyright/Intellectual Property
38 J.C. Bertot et al. / Government Information Quarterly 29 (2012) 3040
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(continued)
Policy instrument Policy type Description
Various Copyright (Title 17 USC) and
Patent & Trademark (Title 35 USC)
legislation
The ease of copying and propagating data from many sources on the internet
facilitates the potential breach of various copyright laws:
Social media technologies that allow public contribution of content can create
challenges regarding the protection of Intellectual Property contributed by visitors.
Agencies should establish policies and post clear disclaimers detailing the
copyrights that non-government contributors to their sites may retain.
Agencies should ensure that they consider existing intellectual property and
copyright laws when implementing social media technologies.
Government data:
Federal government typically provides public data which is not considered
copyrightable intellectual property.
Government content on any site is generally public domain and therefore cannot
become the intellectual property of an individual or service provider.
Need to ensure that copyright is not implied or stated on a government-created
work, unless specically permitted by statute.
39 J.C. Bertot et al. / Government Information Quarterly 29 (2012) 3040
Smith, M. A., & Kollock, P. (1999). Communities in cyberspace. New York, NY: Routledge.
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article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9129043.
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with blind users of the usability of two interfaces for a social networking platform.
Presented at iConference 2011, Seattle, WA, United States.
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Washington DC: Author.
Wyld, D. (2008). The blogging revolution: Government in the age of Web 2.0. Washington
DC: IBM Center for the Business of Government.
40 J.C. Bertot et al. / Government Information Quarterly 29 (2012) 3040