In the upcoming appeal of the $222,000 judgment against Ms. Jammie Thomas, the outcome will likely turn on Jury Instruction #15, which equates "making available" with "distributing" a copyrighted work. If the appeals court rejects that jury instruction, the verdict against Ms. Thomas would have to be thrown...

In the wake of the $220,000 verdict against Ms. Thomas, for file-sharing, some have asked whether she can avoid the judgment by filing for personal bankruptcy. The question is a complicated one, and, as it happens, EFF posted a memo last summer explaining the law in this area,...

Four years after it began, the Recording Industry Association of America?s (RIAA) campaign to intimidate music fans by randomly singling out individuals for lawsuits has, for the first time, made it to a jury trial. Despite the RIAA's previous claim that defendants have no right to a jury...

Yesterday, the House Committee on Energy and Commerce opened an investigation into warrantless wiretapping, asking for details from telecommunications providers about government efforts to obtain customer data. In addition, several key members of the committee sent letters to EFF and other civil liberties groups, requesting assistance in the committee's...

The AP, the Washington Post, and Wired's Threat Level are reporting on today's testimony by Jack Goldsmith, former head of the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel. Goldsmith testified that there were certain aspects of the warrantless surveillance program "that I could not find the legal support...

Good news from California's Alameda County -- a judge has voided election results after the county botched its response to a contested race conducted on Diebold electronic voting machines. The judge ordered that the disputed Measure R -- an initiative addressing the operation of medical marijuana dispensaries -- go...