Applying for citizenship? Be careful what you post on Facebook or Tweet. Big Brother is watching.

Having secured documents through the Freedom of Information Act, the Electronic Freedom Foundation has uncovered some disturbing information.

In 2008, the Office of Fraud Detection and National Security, a part of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services ordering its agents to monitor social networks in their investigations of persons seeking to become naturalized U.S. citizens, noting that:

Narcissistic tendencies in many people fuels a need to have a large group of “friends” link to their pages and many of these people accept cyber-friends that they don’t even know. This provides an excellent vantage point for FDNS to observe the daily life of beneficiaries and petitioners who are suspected of fraudulent activities.

It recommends that investigators “friend” applicants for citizenship to monitor things like their relationship status and to be alert for casual, off-hand remarks that candidate citizens might make that would tip them to fraud or other disqualifying elements in their lives.

Since social networks are public records that also include time-lines, the foundation points out, they can become tantamount to warrentless searches.

That’s scary.