- www.fightforthefuture.org Executive Order taking on monopolies is a great start. But the Biden admin needs to nominate a 5th FCC commissioner to restore net neutrality
This morning, President Joe Biden released an Executive Order on Promoting Competition in the American Economy. Fight for the Future released the following statement, which can be attributed to Evan Greer, Director (she/her): There’s a lot of stuff to love in this Executive Order, unless you’re the ...
- www.eff.org Digital Rights Updates with EFFector 33.4
Want the latest news on your digital rights? Then you're in luck! Version 33, issue 4 of EFFector, our monthly-ish email newsletter, is out now! Catch up on rising issues in online security, privacy, and free expression with EFF by reading our newsletter or listening to the new audio version below.....
- www.fightforthefuture.org Trump’s lawsuit against social media is meaningless theater
This morning, former President Donald Trump announced his intent to sue the CEOs of Facebook, Google, and Twitter for their companies’ decisions to deplatform him, claiming this infringes on his First Amendment right. His intent to sue also demands that Section 230 be declared unconstitutional...
- www.eff.org The Internet Loses a Champion with the Passing of Sherwin Siy
We at EFF are devastated to learn of the passing of Sherwin Siy. He was a brilliant advocate and strategist who was dedicated to protecting and preserving the internet as a space for creativity, innovation and sharing. He was also a friend and generous mentor who shaped the present and future of...
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EFF Gets $300,000 Boost from Craig Newmark Philanthropies to Protect
www.eff.org EFF Gets $300,000 Boost from Craig Newmark Philanthropies to Protect Journalists and Fight Consumer SpywareSan Francisco – The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is proud to announce its latest grant from Craig Newmark Philanthropies: $300,000 to help protect journalists and fight consumer spyware.“This donation will help us to develop tools and training for both working journalists and student...
- www.eff.org Greetings from the Internet! Connect with EFF this Summer
For one more day, you can become an EFF member for just $20, and get a limited-edition series of Digital Freedom Analog Postcards!
- www.eff.org The Future Is in Symmetrical, High-Speed Internet Speeds
Congress is about to make critical decisions about the future of internet access and speed in the United States. It has a potentially once-in-a-lifetime amount of funding to spend on broadband infrastructure, and at the heart of this debate is the minimum speed requirement for taxpayer-funded...
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Victory! Fourth Circuit Rules Baltimore’s Warrantless Aerial
www.eff.org Victory! Fourth Circuit Rules Baltimore’s Warrantless Aerial Surveillance Program UnconstitutionalThis blog post was cowritten by EFF intern Lauren Yu.The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit ruled last week that Baltimore’s use of aerial surveillance that could track the movements of the entire city violated the Fourth Amendment.The case, Leaders of a Beautiful Struggle v. Baltimore...
- www.eff.org EFF is Highlighting LGBTQ+ Issues Year-Round
EFF is dedicated to ensuring that technology supports freedom, justice and innovation for all the people of the world. While digital freedom is an LGBTQ+ issue, LGBTQ+ issues are also digital rights issues. For example, LGBTQ+ communities are often those most likely to experience firsthand how big.....
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Supreme Court Narrows Ability to Hold U.S. Corporations Accountable
www.eff.org Supreme Court Narrows Ability to Hold U.S. Corporations Accountable for Facilitating Human Rights Abuses AbroadPeople around the world have been horrified at the role that technology companies like Cisco, Yahoo!, and Sandvine have played in helping governments commit gross human rights abuses. That’s why EFF has consistently called out technology companies, and American companies in particular, that allow...
- www.eff.org Victory! Biden Administration Rescinds Dangerous DHS Proposed Rule to Expand Biometrics Collection
Marking a big win for the privacy and civil liberties of immigrant communities, the Biden Administration recently rescinded a Trump-era proposed rule that would have massively expanded the collection of biometrics from people applying for an immigration benefit. Introduced in September 2020, the U.....
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PCLOB “Book Report” Fails to Investigate or Tell the Public the Truth
www.eff.org PCLOB “Book Report” Fails to Investigate or Tell the Public the Truth About Domestic Mass SurveillanceThe Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board (PCLOB) has concluded its six-year investigation into Executive Order 12333, one of the most sprawling and influential authorities that enables the U.S. government’s mass surveillance programs. The result is a bland, short summary of a classified...
- www.eff.org A Wide, Diverse Coalition Agrees on What Congress Needs to Do About Our Broadband
A massive number of groups representing interests as diverse as education, agriculture, tech sector, public and private broadband providers, low-income advocacy, workers, and urban and rural community economic development entities came together to ask Congress to be bold in its infrastructure plan. ...
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EFF to Ecuador's Human Rights Secretariat: Protecting Security
www.eff.org EFF to Ecuador's Human Rights Secretariat: Protecting Security Experts is Vital to Safeguard Everyone's RightsToday, EFF sent a letter to Ecuador's Human Rights Secretariat about the troubling, slow-motion case against the Swedish computer security expert Ola Bini since his arrest in April 2019, following Julian Assange's ejection from Ecuador's London Embassy. Ola Bini faced 70 days of imprisonment until.....
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Supreme Court Says You Can’t Sue the Corporation that Wrongly Marked
www.eff.org Supreme Court Says You Can’t Sue the Corporation that Wrongly Marked You A TerroristIn a 5-4 decision, the Supreme Court late last week barred the courthouse door to thousands of people who were wrongly marked as “potential terrorists” by credit giant TransUnion. The Court’s analysis of their “standing” —whether they were sufficiently injured to file a lawsuit—reflects a naïve...
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Decoding California's New Digital Vaccine Records and Potential
www.eff.org Decoding California's New Digital Vaccine Records and Potential DangersThis post was updated on 6/29/21 to more accurately describe how New York is running its voluntary vaccine passport programThe State of California recently released what it calls a “Digital COVID-19 Vaccine Record.” It is part of that state’s recent easing of public health rules on masking within...
- www.eff.org [VISUAL] The Overlapping Infrastructure of Urban Surveillance, and How to Fix It
If you could take a cross-section of the average city block, you would see the ways that the built environment of surveillance—its physical presence in, over, and under our cities—makes the various types of surveillance an entwined problem that must be combatted through entwined solutions. We decide...
- www.eff.org Now Is The Time: Tell Congress to Ban Federal Use of Face Recognition
Cities and states across the country have banned government use of face surveillance technology, and many more are weighing proposals to do so. From Boston to San Francisco, New Orleans to Minneapolis, elected officials and activists know that face surveillance gives police the power to track us...
- www.eff.org How Big ISPs Are Trying to Burn California’s $7 Billion Broadband Fund
A month ago, Governor Newsom announced a plan to invest $7 billion of federal rescue funds and state surplus dollars to be mostly invested into public broadband infrastructure meant to serve every California with affordable access to infrastructure ready for 21st century demands. In short, the propo...
- www.eff.org Supreme Court Upholds Process to Challenge Bad Patents
The Patent Office grants thousands of patents a year, including many that would be invalidated if a court considered them. These junk patents should never be issued in the first place, but fortunately there is a way to challenge them at the Patent Office rather than wasting the courts’ time and...
- www.eff.org Standing With Security Researchers Against Misuse of the DMCA
Security research is vital to protecting the computers upon which we all depend, and protecting the people who have integrated electronic devices into their daily lives. To conduct security research, we need to protect the researchers, and allow them the tools to find and fix vulnerabilities. The...
- www.eff.org Understanding Amazon Sidewalk
Just before the long weekend at the end of May, Amazon announced the release of their Sidewalk mesh network. There are many misconceptions about what it is and what it does, so this article will untangle some of the confusion.It Isn’t Internet SharingMuch of the press about Amazon Sidewalk has said....
- www.eff.org Congress Wants to Put the Brakes on Runaway Acquisitions by Big Tech
The Judiciary Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives recently released a comprehensive series of bills designed to curb the excesses of Big Tech. One of them, the Platform Competition and Opportunity Act, addresses one of the biggest, most obvious problems among the largest tech companies:.....
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A Long Overdue Reckoning For Online Proctoring Companies May Finally
www.eff.org A Long Overdue Reckoning For Online Proctoring Companies May Finally Be HereFor years, online proctoring companies have played fast and loose when talking about their ability to “automatically” detect cheating. At last, one proctoring company has announced that it will no longer sell fully-automated proctoring services. This is a good step toward eliminating some of the iss...
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The new ACCESS Act is a good start. Here’s how to make sure it delivers.
www.eff.org The New ACCESS Act Is a Good Start. Here’s How to Make Sure It Delivers.We’ve praised the ACCESS Act as “a step towards a more interoperable future.” However, the bill currently before Congress is just a first step, and it’s far from perfect. While we strongly agree with the authors’ intent, some important changes would make sure that the ACCESS Act delivers on its prom...
- www.eff.org Changing Section 230 Won’t Make the Internet a Kinder, Gentler Place
Tech platforms, especially the largest ones, have a problem—there’s a lot of offensive junk online. Many lawmakers on Capitol Hill keep coming back to the same solution—blaming Section 230.What lawmakers don’t notice is that a lot of the people posting that offensive junk get stopped, again and...
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Emails from 2016 Show Amazon Ring's Hold on the LAPD Through Camera
www.eff.org Emails from 2016 Show Amazon Ring's Hold on the LAPD Through Camera GiveawaysIn March 2016, “smart” doorbell camera maker Ring was a growing company attempting to market its wireless smart security camera when it received an email from an officer in the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) Gang and Narcotics Division, who was interested in purchasing a slew of devices.The...
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EFF : 22 Rights Groups Tell PayPal and Venmo to Shape Up Policies on Account Closures
www.eff.org 22 Rights Groups Tell PayPal and Venmo to Shape Up Policies on Account ClosuresSan Francisco – Nearly two dozen rights groups, including the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), have joined together to tell PayPal and its subsidiary Venmo to shape up its policies on account freezes and closures, as its opaque practices are interfering with payment systems connected to many...
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EFF : Activists Mobilize to Fight Censorship and Save Open Science
www.eff.org Activists Mobilize to Fight Censorship and Save Open ScienceMajor publishers want to censor research-sharing resource Sci-Hub from the internet, but archivists quickly respond to make that impossible. More than half of academic publishing is controlled by major publishers using burdensome paywalls. One project in particular, Sci-Hub, has threatened to break ...
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EFF : Unconstitutional Florida Law Barring Platforms from Suspending Politicians Should be Blocked, EFF Tells Court
www.eff.org Unconstitutional Florida Law Barring Platforms from Suspending Politicians Should be Blocked, EFF Tells CourtTallahassee, Florida—The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and Protect Democracy urged a federal judge to strike down Florida’s law banning Facebook, Twitter, and other platforms from suspending political candidates’ accounts, saying it unconstitutionally interferes with the First Amendment...
- spreadprivacy.com EFF Adopts DuckDuckGo HTTPS Dataset
We’re proud to announce EFF is switching to the DuckDuckGo Smarter Encryption dataset in their HTTPS Everywhere extension, which automatically upgrades to secure website connections when possible.