California Is Putting Together A Broadband Plan. We Have Thoughts.
Right now the California Public Utilities Commission and the California Broadband Council are collecting public comments to create the California Broadband Plan, per Governor Newsom’s Executive Order 73-20. The order’s purpose is to find a way to deliver 100 mbps-capable Internet connections to around 2 million Californians who lack...
Come Back with a Warrant for my Virtual House
Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality in your home can involve the creation of an intimate portrait of your private life. The VR/AR headsets can request audio and video of the inside of our house, telemetry about our movements, depth data and images that can build a highly accurate geometrical representation...
Throwing Out the FTC's Suit Against Qualcomm Moves Antitrust Law in the Wrong Direction
The government bestows temporary monopolies in the form of patents to promote future innovation and economic growth. Antitrust law empowers the government to break up monopolies when their power is so great and their conduct is so corrosive of competition that they can dictate market outcomes without worrying about their...
Civil Rights and First Amendment Defenders Urge First Circuit to Require a Warrant for Border Device Searches
Last month, EFF, along with co-counsel ACLU and ACLU of Massachusetts, filed a brief in Alasaad v. Wolf urging the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit to require a warrant for searches of electronic devices at the border. In fiscal year 2019, border officers searched ...
Victory! Court Orders CA Prisons to Release Race of Parole Candidates
In a win for transparency, a state court judge ordered the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) to disclose records regarding the race and ethnicity of parole candidates. This is also a win for innovation, because the plaintiffs will use this data to build new technology in service...
EFF and ACLU Tell Federal Court that Forensic Software Source Code Must Be Disclosed
Can secret software be used to generate key evidence against a criminal defendant? In an amicus filed ten days ago with the United States District Court of the Western District of Pennsylvania, EFF and the ACLU of Pennsylvania explain that secret forensic technology is inconsistent with criminal defendants’ constitutional rights...
In Historic Opinion, Third Circuit Protects Public School Students’ Off-Campus Social Media Speech
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit issued an historic opinion in B.L. v. Mahanoy Area School District, upholding the free speech rights of public school students. The court adopted the position EFF urged in our amicus brief that the First Amendment prohibits disciplining public school...
A Legal Deep Dive on Mexico’s Disastrous New Copyright Law
Mexico has just adopted a terrible new copyright law, thanks to pressure from the United States (and specifically from the copyright maximalists that hold outsized influence on US foreign policy).This law closely resembles the Digital Millennium Copyright Act enacted in the US 1998, with a few differences that make it...
EFF Files Amicus Brief Arguing Geofence Warrants Violate the Fourth Amendment
Should the police be able to force Google to turn over identifying information on every phone within a certain geographic area—potentially hundreds or thousands of devices—just because a crime occurred there? We don’t think so. As we argued in an amicus brief filed recently in People v. Dawes, a...
EFF to Court: Social Media Users Have Privacy and Free Speech Interests in Their Public Information
Special thanks to legal intern Rachel Sommers, who was the lead author of this post.Visa applicants to the United States are required to disclose personal information including their work, travel, and family histories. And as of May 2019, they are required to register their social media accounts...
