“New York police are legally permitted to use fake social media profiles and if someone unknowingly accepts a friend request from a cop it counts as consent, according to Stop legal director David Siffert.”
The NYPD paid Voyager Labs nearly $9m in 2018 and over $1.6m to renew in 2021. Meta says Voyager ran 38,000 fake accounts, then made 17,000 more after its access was revoked. The software flags anyone with four mutual friends as an “indirect” connection. The public learned the price only through a records request.