Welcome! The fact that you’re reading this means that you probably care deeply about the issue of privacy, which warms our hearts. Unfortunately, even though you care about privacy, or perhaps because you care so much about it, you may feel that there's not much you (or anyone) … | Continue reading
EFF is here to keep you up-to-date with the latest news about your digital rights! EFFector 36.2 is out now and covers a ton of the latest news, including: a victory, as Amazon's Ring will no longer facilitate warrantless footage requests from police; an analysis on Apple's annou … | Continue reading
Cyber mercenaries present a grave threat to human rights and freedom of expression. They have been implicated in surveillance, torture, and even murder of human rights defenders, political candidates, and journalists. One of the most effective ways that the human rights community … | Continue reading
Security researchers’ work discovering and reporting vulnerabilities in software, firmware, networks, and devices protects people, businesses and governments around the world from malware, theft of critical data, and other cyberattacks. The internet and the digital ecosystem ar … | Continue reading
Letter to be submitted by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, accredited under operative paragraph No. 9 of UN General Assembly Resolution 75/282 on behalf of 124 signatories. We, the undersigned, representing a broad spectrum of the global security research community, write to e … | Continue reading
Security researchers’ work discovering and reporting vulnerabilities in software, firmware, networks, and devices protects people, businesses and governments around the world from malware, theft of critical data, and other cyberattacks. The internet and the digital ecosystem ar … | Continue reading
If you live in San Francisco, there is an election on March 5, 2024 during which voters will decide a number of specific local ballot measures—including Proposition E. Proponents of Proposition E have raised over $1 million …but what does the measure actually do? This will break … | Continue reading
A new report reveals that in just three months, from July 1 to September 30, 2023, the San Francisco Police Department (SFPD) racked up 193 hours and 19 minutes of live access to non-city surveillance cameras. That means for the equivalent of 8 days, police sat behind a desk and … | Continue reading
Your grandfather receives a call late at night from a person pretending to be you. The caller says that you are in jail or have been kidnapped and that they need money urgently to get you out of trouble. Perhaps they then bring on a fake police officer or kidnapper to heighten th … | Continue reading
You may have heard recently that Apple is planning to implement Rich Communication Services (RCS) on iPhones, once again igniting the green versus blue bubble debate. RCS will thankfully bring a number of long-missing features to those green bubble conversations in Messages, but … | Continue reading
Civil Liberties Groups Urge Attorney General Bonta to Enforce California's Automated License Plate Reader LawsSAN FRANCISCO—California Attorney General Rob Bonta should crack down on police agencies that still violate Californians’ privacy by sharing automated license plate … | Continue reading
As part of the United Nations (U.N.) Independent Expert on protection against violence and discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity (IE SOGI) report to the U.N. Human Rights Council, EFF and Access Now have submitted information addressing digital rights and … | Continue reading
UN Member States are meeting in New York this week to conclude negotiations over the final text of the UN Cybercrime Treaty, which—despite warnings from hundreds of civil society organizations across the globe, security researchers, media rights defenders, and the world’s largest … | Continue reading
As Copyright Week comes to a close, it’s worth remembering why we have in it January. Twelve years ago, a diverse coalition of internet users, websites, and public interest activists took to the internet to protest SOPA/PIPA, proposed laws that would have, among other things, blo … | Continue reading
Amid reports that the site formerly known as Twitter is dropping in value, hindering how people use the site, and has had controversial removals of accounts. It has never been more precarious to rely on the site, now called X, as a historical record. So, it’s important for indivi … | Continue reading
Do you care about being able to fix and modify your stuff? Then it's time to speak up and tell the Federal Trade Commission that you care about your right to repair. As we have said before, you own what you buy—and you should be able do what you want with it. That should be the e … | Continue reading
San Francisco voters will confront a looming threat to their privacy and civil liberties on the March 5, 2024 ballot. If Proposition E passes, we can expect the San Francisco Police Department (SFPD) will use untested and potentially dangerous technology on the public, any time t … | Continue reading
It’s 1975. Earth, Wind and Fire rule the airwaves, Jaws is on every theater screen, All In the Family is must-see TV, and Bill Gates and Paul Allen are selling software for the first personal computer, the Altair 8800. But for copyright lawyers, and eventually the public, somethi … | Continue reading
Amazon’s Ring has announced that it will no longer facilitate police's warrantless requests for footage from Ring users. This is a victory in a long fight, not just against blanket police surveillance, but also against a culture in which private, for-profit companies build specia … | Continue reading
We're taking part in Copyright Week, a series of actions and discussions supporting key principles that should guide copyright policy. Every day this week, various groups are taking on different elements of copyright law and policy, addressing what's at stake and what we need to … | Continue reading
EFF has joined forces with 110 NGOs today in a joint statement delivered to the United Nations Ad Hoc Committee, clearly outlining civil society non-negotiable redlines for the proposed UN Cybercrime Treaty, and asserting that states should reject the proposed treaty if these ess … | Continue reading
Every January, we celebrate the addition of formerly copyrighted works to the public domain. You’ve likely heard that this year’s crop of public domain newcomers includes Steamboat Willie, the 1928 cartoon that marked Mickey Mouse’s debut. When something enters the public domain, … | Continue reading
Our government shouldn’t be spying on journalists. Nor should law enforcement agencies force journalists to identify their confidential sources or go to prison. To fix this, we need to change the law. Now, we’ve got our best chance in years. The House of Representatives has pass … | Continue reading
We're taking part in Copyright Week, a series of actions and discussions supporting key principles that should guide copyright policy. Every day this week, various groups are taking on different elements of copyright law and policy, addressing what's at stake and what we need to … | Continue reading
New year, but EFF is still here to keep you up to date with the latest digital rights happenings! Be sure to check out our latest newsletter, EFFector 36.1, which covers topics ranging from: our thoughts on AI watermarking, changes in the tech landscape we'd like to see in 2024, … | Continue reading
Creators have reason to be wary of the generative AI future. For one thing, while GenAI can be a valuable tool for creativity, it may also be used to deceive the public and disrupt existing markets for creative labor. Performers, in particular, worry that AI-generated images and … | Continue reading
For years, people have been impersonating police online in order to get companies to hand over incredibly sensitive personal information. Reporting by 404 Media recently revealed that Verizon handed over the address and phone logs of an individual to a stalker pretending to be a … | Continue reading
Since EFF was formed in 1990, we’ve been working hard to protect digital rights for all. And as each year passes, we’ve come to understand the challenges and opportunities a little better, as well as what we’re not willing to accept. Accordingly, here’s what we’d like to see a l … | Continue reading
Phone app location data brokers are a growing menace to our privacy and safety. All you did was click a box while downloading an app. Now the app tracks your every move and sends it to a broker, which then sells your location data to the highest bidder, from advertisers to police … | Continue reading
The Updated and Expanded Hub Sheds New Light on the Digital Surveillance Dragnet that Law Enforcement Deploys Against EveryoneSAN FRANCISCO—The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) today unveiled its new Street Level Surveillance hub, a standalone website featuring expanded and u … | Continue reading
The latest version of Privacy Badger replaces embedded tweets with click-to-activate placeholders. This is part of Privacy Badger's widget replacement feature, where certain potentially useful widgets are blocked and then replaced with placeholders. This protects privacy by defau … | Continue reading
The UAE confirmed this week that it has placed 84 detainees on trial, on charges of “establishing another secret organization for the purpose of committing acts of violence and terrorism on state territory.” Suspected to be among those facing trial is award-winning human rights d … | Continue reading
EFF has been awarded a new $200,000 grant from Craig Newmark Philanthropies to strengthen our cybersecurity work in 2024. We are especially grateful this year, as it marks 30 years of donations from Craig Newmark, who joined as an EFF member just three years after our founding an … | Continue reading
These Dragnet Searches Violate the Privacy of Millions of Americans SAN FRANCISCO—Keyword warrants that let police indiscriminately sift through search engine databases are unconstitutional dragnets that target free speech, lack particularity and probable cause, and violate the p … | Continue reading
Generative AI allows people to produce piles upon piles of images and words very quickly. It would be nice if there were some way to reliably distinguish AI-generated content from human-generated content. It would help people avoid endlessly arguing with bots online, or believing … | Continue reading
As millions of internet users watch videos online for news and entertainment, it is essential to uphold a federal privacy law that protects against the disclosure of everyone’s viewing history, EFF argued in court last month. For decades, the Video Privacy Protection Act (VPPA) h … | Continue reading
Video footage captured by police drones sent in response to 911 calls cannot be kept entirely secret from the public, a California appellate court ruled last week. The decision by the California Court of Appeal for the Fourth District came after a journalist sought access to vide … | Continue reading
An increase in anti-LGBTQ+ intolerance is impacting individuals and communities both online and offline across the globe. Throughout 2023, several countries sought to pass explicitly anti-LGBTQ+ initiatives restricting freedom of expression and privacy. This fuels offline intoler … | Continue reading
It’s a big year for the oozing creep of corporate paternalism and ad-tracking technology online. Google and its subsidiary companies have tightened their grips on the throat of internet innovation, all while employing the now familiar tactic of marketing these things as beneficia … | Continue reading
At EFF, we believe that all the rights we have in the offline world–to speak freely, create culture, play games, build things and do business–must hold up in the digital world, as well. EFF’s longstanding project of fighting for a more balanced, just patent system has always bor … | Continue reading
When a system becomes too tightly-controlled and centralized, the people being squeezed tend to push back to reclaim their lost autonomy. The internet is no exception. While the internet began as a loose affiliation of universities and government bodies, that emergent digital com … | Continue reading
Legislatures in more than half of the country targeted young people’s use of social media this year, with many of the proposals blocking adults’ ability to access the same sites. State representatives introduced dozens of bills that would limit young people’s use of some of the m … | Continue reading
Private communication is a fundamental human right. In the online world, the best tool we have to defend this right is end-to-end encryption. Yet throughout 2023, politicians across Europe attempted to undermine encryption, seeking to access and scan our private messages and pict … | Continue reading
Whatever online harms you want to alleviate on the internet today, you can do it better—with a broader impact—if you enact strong consumer data privacy legislation first. That is a grounding principle that has informed much of EFF’s consumer protection work in 2023. While consume … | Continue reading
EFF works every year to improve policy in ways that protect your digital rights in states across the country. Thanks to the messages of hundreds of EFF members across the country, we've spoken up for digital rights this year from Sacramento to Augusta. Much of EFF's state legisla … | Continue reading
EFF has long advocated for affordable, accessible, future-proof internet access for all. Nearly 80% of Americans already consider internet access to be as essential as water and electricity, so as our work, health services, education, entertainment, social lives, etc. increasingl … | Continue reading
Lawmakers, schools districts, educational technology companies and others keep rolling out legislation and software that threatens students’ privacy, free speech, and access to social media, in the name of “protecting” children. At EFF, we fought back against this overreach and d … | Continue reading
There’s been plenty of bad news regarding federal legislation in 2023. For starters, Congress has failed to pass meaningful comprehensive data privacy reforms. Instead, legislators have spent an enormous amount of energy pushing dangerous legislation that’s intended to limit youn … | Continue reading