D.C. Circuit Offers Bad News, Good News on Net Neutrality: FCC Repeal Upheld, But States Can Fill the Gap
Users, advocates, and service providers have been waiting for months to find out whether an appellate court will bless the Federal Communications Commission’s effort to repeal net neutrality protections, and whether the FCC can simultaneously force the states to follow suit. The answer: yes, and no. Bound by its interpretation...
Senate Antitrust Hearing Explores Big Tech’s Merger Mania
The Senate Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Antitrust, Competition and Consumer Rights held a hearing last week to explore the competitive impacts of big tech companies’ massive string of mergers with smaller companies in the last handful of years. Before the Senate committee were experts in venture capital spending, the Federal...
California: Tell Governor Newsom to Stop Face Surveillance on Police Body Cams
Communities called for police officers to carry or wear cameras, with the hope that doing so would improve police accountability, not further mass surveillance. But today, we stand at a crossroads: face recognition technology is now capable of being interfaced with body-worn cameras in real-time—a development that has grave implications...
Help EFF Find Our Next Development Director
EFF’s member base is different from that of any other organization I know. I can’t count how many times someone has seen me in my EFF hoodie and excitedly approached me to show me their membership card. Our members are passionate about protecting civil liberties online, and being EFF members...
The FISA Oversight Hearing Confirmed That Things Need to Change
Section 215, the controversial law at the heart of the NSA’s massive telephone records surveillance program, is set to expire in December. Last week the House Committee on the Judiciary held an oversight hearing to investigate how the NSA, FBI, and the rest of the intelligence community are using...
South Africa Bans Bulk Collection. Will the U.S. Courts Follow Suit?
The High Court in South Africa has issued a watershed ruling: holding that South African law currently does not authorize bulk surveillance. The decision is a model that we hope other courts, including those in the United States, will follow.Read the decision here.As an initial matter, the South African...
The Christchurch Call Comes to the UN
On Monday, EFF participated in the Christchurch Call Leaders’ Dialogue at the UN General Assembly in New York in our capacity as a member of the Christchurch Call Advisory Network. The meeting, chaired by the leaders of New Zealand, France, and Jordan, featured speeches from a diverse array of government...
European Court’s Decision in Right To Be Forgotten Case is a Win for Free Speech
In a significant victory for free speech rights, the European Union’s highest court ruled that the EU’s Right to Be Forgotten does not require Google to delist search results globally, thus keeping the results available to be seen by users around the world.The EU standard, established in...
EFF to HUD: Algorithms Are No Excuse for Discrimination
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) is considering adopting new rules that would effectively insulate landlords, banks, and insurance companies that use algorithmic models from lawsuits that claim their practices have an unjustified discriminatory effect. HUD’s proposal is flawed, and suggests that the agency doesn’t understand...
Nigeria Misuses Overbroad Cyberstalking Law: Levels Charges Against Political Protester Sowore
EFF has long been concerned that—unless carefully drafted and limited—cyberstalking laws can be misused to criminalize political speech. In fact, earlier this year we celebrated a federal court decision in Washington State in the United States that tossed out an overbroad cyberstalking law. In the case, the law had...









