The now-famous Emojis are also considered words and there are many who consider them a very modern form of digital writing.
That's what New York City police officers seem to have figured out when they saw the Facebook of 17-year-old Osiris Aristy from Bushwick, Brooklyn. Aristy posted pictures of himself, along with gun emojis and words like: "feel like katxhin a body right now."
However, as reported in the relevant reports, he also posted images of small gun emojis, which marked emoji police officers' heads. Despite his young age, Aristy has a full criminal record, with 12 arrests, for offenses such as criminal possession of a weapon, robbery and assault.
His Facebook page appears to have been under police surveillance, and when the emojis and other messages were discovered, police arrested him. He had also made terrorist threats, among other things. The publication continues by saying that the lawsuit alleges: “As a result of this conduct, the defendant has caused fear among New York City police officers, both for their own safety and for public safety, and is constantly on high alert.”.
After the killing of two officers last month in New York, there is certainly a vigilance by authorities regarding threats on social media. The culprit at the time had posted threats against police officers on his Instagram.
But how can the police or anyone else tell whether social media posts may be real threats or not? Millions of people around the world use social media , trying hard to impress anyone they can, satisfying their egos.
With hundreds of millions of posts every day on Facebook and many other sites, there are endless threats and dangers. Every word, every image, and indeed every emoji, could mean something. Or it could mean nothing.
