We have often observed that one of the most pernicious aspects of U.S. copyright law is the outrageously disproportionate statutory damages an infringer may have to pay--from $750 to $150,000 per work, no matter how minimal the actual harm caused by the infringement. And we are not alone: last September,...

The Obama Administration’s shocking decision to assert Bush-era arguments in its motion to dismiss EFF’s case against the government for warrantless wiretapping, Jewel v. NSA, has been slowly working its way into the mainstream news. We’re still hoping for more coverage, but for now there are several...

The term "machinima" (machine + cinema) has been coined to describe movies made using video games. In addition to being an inspiring new "film" genre, it's also at the cutting edge of many important legal questions at the intersection of copyright, trademark, and contractual restrictions (i.e., EULAs and ToS)....

On Friday, EFF and the law firm of Fish and Richardson filed an emergency motion to quash [pdf] and for the return of seized property on behalf of a Boston College computer science student whose computers, cell phone, and other property were seized as part of an investigation...

There's a new bill working its way through Congress that is cause for some alarm: the Cybersecurity Act of 2009 (PDF summary here), introduced by Senators Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) and Olympia Snowe (R-ME). The bill as it exists now risks giving the federal government unprecedented power over...

Wednesday evening, EFF Senior Staff Attorney Kevin Bankston was a guest on Countdown With Keith Olbermann. He spoke about the Obama Justice Department's recent disappointing arguments in Jewel v NSA.

Also notable was House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's appearance on the same program, in which she suggested that...