What Facebook Wants in Cybersecurity Doesn’t Require Trampling On Our Privacy Rights
Numerous commentators have noted the sore thumb in the group of supporters for The Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA): Facebook. Why would a social network be endorsing a bill that would allow companies to pass personal information about Internet users to the government without any form...
European Data Retention Directive At Work: Polish Authorities Abuse Access to Users' Data
The Polish digital civil rights group Panoptykon Foundation recently published harrowing findings regarding abuses of Poland’s mandatory data retention law. Using a Freedom of Information Act request, Panoptykon obtained documents that reveal that in 2011, Polish authorities requested users’ traffic data retained by telcos and ISPs over...
April 2012, the State of Do Not Track: Lead Up to Tracking Protecting Working Group Negotiations in Washington, DC
Things are heating up in the Do Not Track campaign. Next week, EFF Technology Projects Director Peter Eckersley will be joining Internet engineers, privacy advocates, and industry groups in Washington, DC for intense negotiations around the future of online tracking. Here’s our overview of the latest developments likely to...
UK Government Proposes Law Monitoring Every Email, Phone Call, and Text Message
On Sunday, the United Kingdom’s Prime Minister David Cameron and the Interior Ministry were forced to defend a sweeping wiretapping proposal, which would aim to monitor every single email, text message, and phone call flowing through the whole country. The proposal would likely force all UK Internet Service Providers...
This Week in Transparency: Warrantless Cell Phone Tracking, Drones, and FBI Surveillance
ACLU Public Records Requests Shed New Light on Use of Cell Phone Tracking
Over the weekend, the ACLU released an exhaustive study of state and local law enforcement’s surveillance practices in regards to how often police forces are tracking citizens’ movements through their cell phones. The findings were...
Proposed Laws in Lebanon and Iraq Threaten Online Speech
More than a year after the start of the "Arab Spring," large portions of the Middle East remain in upheaval. Even in the most stable of countries, press freedom--and by extension, online freedom--remains up for debate. We've highlighted the ongoing debate in Tunisia over online filtering, and have touched...
“Zero-day” exploit sales should be key point in cybersecurity debate
Last week, Forbes’ Andy Greenberg investigated a dangerous but largely underreported problem in Internet security: the sale of zero-day exploits to customers not intending to fix the flaws. Zero-day exploits are hacking techniques that take advantage of software vulnerabilities that haven’t been disclosed to the developer or the public....
Four Unanswered Questions About the Cybersecurity Bills
The U.S. legislature has cybersecurity on the brain. In the coming months, Congress and the Senate will consider a confusing variety of cybersecurity bills--including H.R. 3523 (Rogers), H.R. 3674 (Lungren), S. 2105 (Lieberman), and S. 215 (McCain)--all of which purport to keep U.S. companies and...
FTC Final Privacy Report Draws a Map to Meaningful Privacy Protection in the Online World
Earlier today, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) released its final report on digital consumer privacy issues after more than 450 companies, advocacy groups and individuals commented on the December 2010 draft report. The final report creates strong guidelines for protecting consumer privacy choices in the online world. The guidelines...
New Counterterrorism Guidelines Gives Authorities Vast Access to Private Info of Innocent Americans
On Thursday, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder signed expansive new guidelines for terrorism analysts, allowing the National Counter Terrorism Center (NCTC) to mirror entire federal databases containing personal information and hold onto the information for an extended period of time—even if the person is not suspected of any involvement...
