EFF Report Shows FBI Is Failing to Address First Amendment Harms Caused By National Security Letters
EFF has long fought to end the FBI’s ability to impose gag orders via National Security Letters (NSLs). They violate the First Amendment and result in indefinite prohibitions on recipients’ ability to speak publicly about controversial government surveillance powers. Records and data released by the FBI earlier this year confirm...
Victory: San Diego to Suspend Face Recognition Program, Limits ICE Access To Criminal Justice Data
We just stopped one of the largest, longest running, and most controversial face recognition programs operated by local law enforcement in the United States. A face recognition system used by more than 30 agencies in San Diego County, California will be suspended on Jan. 1, 2020, according to a...
The Senate Judiciary Committee Wants Everyone to Know It’s Concerned About Encryption
This morning the Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing on encryption and “lawful access.” That’s the fanciful idea that encryption providers can somehow allow law enforcement access to users’ encrypted data while otherwise preventing the “bad guys” from accessing this very same data.But the hearing was not inspired by...
Genetic Genealogy Company GEDmatch Acquired by Company With Ties to FBI & Law Enforcement—Why You Should Be Worried
This week, GEDmatch, a genetic genealogy company that gained notoriety for giving law enforcement access to its customers’ DNA data, quietly informed its users it is now operated by Verogen, Inc., a company expressly formed two years ago to market “next-generation [DNA] sequencing” technology to crime labs....
Speaking Freely: An Interview With Biella Coleman
Speaking Freely: An Interview With Rima Sghaier
Strengthen California’s Consumer Data Privacy Regulations
EFF and a coalition of privacy advocates have filed comments with the California Attorney General seeking strong regulations to protect consumer data privacy. The draft regulations are a good step forward, but the final regulations should go further.The California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 (CCPA) created new ways...
We Need To Save .ORG From Arbitrary Censorship By Halting the Private Equity Buy-Out
The .ORG top-level domain and all of the nonprofit organizations that depend on it are at risk if a private equity firm is allowed to buy control of it. EFF has joined with over 250 respected nonprofits to oppose the sale of Public Interest Registry, the (currently) nonprofit entity...
Mint: Late-Stage Adversarial Interoperability Demonstrates What We Had (And What We Lost)
In 2006, Aaron Patzer founded Mint. Patzer had grown up in the city of Evansville, Indiana—a place he described as "small, without much economic opportunity"—but had created a successful business building websites. He kept up the business through college and grad school and invested his profits in stocks and...
Certbot Leaves Beta with the Release of 1.0
Earlier this week EFF released Certbot 1.0, the latest version of our free, open source tool that helps websites encrypt their traffic. The release of 1.0 is a significant milestone for the project and is the culmination of the work done over the past few years by EFF and...
