The leading nonprofit defending digital privacy, free speech, and innovation.
FEATURED UPDATE
Many people crossing the U.S. border are concerned about the amount of power that the government has asserted to search and examine travelers’ possessions, including searching through or copying contents of digital devices, like photos, emails, and browsing history. The frequency of these intrusive practices has been increasing over time . Some travelers might choose to delete everything on a particular device or disk to ensure that border agents can’t access its contents, no matter what. Our 2017 guide for...
FEATURED UPDATE
The detention of a group of human rights defenders in Turkey for daring to learn about digital security and encryption continued last week with a brief appearance of the accused in an Istanbul court. Six were returned to jail, and four released on bail. In an additionally absurd twist, the four released activists were named in new detention orders on Friday, and are now being re-arrested . Among those currently being held in jail are Ali Gharavi and Peter Steudtner...
FEATURED UPDATE
Today, a group of over 190 Internet engineers, pioneers, and technologists filed comments with the Federal Communications Commission explaining that the FCC’s plan to roll back net neutrality protections is based on a fundamentally flawed and outdated understanding of how the Internet works. Signers include current and former members of the Internet Engineering Task Force and Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers' committees, professors, CTOs, network security engineers, Internet architects, systems administrators and network engineers, and even one of...
Pull the Plug on Internet Spying Programs
Description:
Every day, the U.S. government sweeps up the emails, text messages, and other online communications of millions of innocent Americans. Congress has a chance to rein in this unconstitutional spying when a key surveillance authority expires at the end of this year.
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Privacy Badger
Description:
Privacy Badger is a browser add-on that stops advertisers and other third-party trackers from secretly tracking where you go and what pages you look at on the web. If an advertiser seems to be tracking you across multiple websites without your permission, Privacy Badger automatically blocks that...
Surveillance Self-Defense
Description:
Surveillance Self-Defense is EFF's online guide to defending yourself and your friends from surveillance by using secure technology and developing careful practices...
The Latest
Stupid Patent of the Month: HP Patents Reminder Messages
On July 25, 2017, the Patent Office issued a patent to HP on reminder messages. Someone needs to remind the Patent Office to look at the real world before issuing patents. United States Patent No. 9,715,680 (the ’680 patent) is titled “Reminder messages.” While the patent...
Which Internet registries offer the best protection for domain owners?
In the Internet’s early days, those wishing to register their own domain name had only a few choices of top-level domain to choose from, such as .com, .net, or .org. Today, users, innovators, and companies can get creative and choose from more than a thousand top-level domains, such as .cool,...
EFF Supports Senate Email and Location Privacy Bill
Congress Must Enact ECPA Reform Legislation This Year EFF applauds Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) and Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) for today introducing the ECPA Modernization Act of 2017 to protect user privacy in cloud content and geolocation information. As part of a congressional effort to reform the ...
How Threats Against Domain Names Are Used to Censor Content
Today EFF and Public Knowledge are releasing a whitepaper titled Which Internet registries offer the best protection for domain owners? Top-level domains are the letters after the dot, like .com, .uk, .biz, or .mobi. Since 2003, hundreds of new top-level domains have come onto the market,...
Throttling on Mobile Networks Is a Sign of Things to Come, Unless We Save Net Neutrality Now
Major mobile carriers are slowing down video streams, a net neutrality violation that heralds things to come if they get their way and roll back legal protections against data discrimination. Recent reports on Reddit from Verizon Wireless customers have drawn attention to video streams being throttled, which ...
The Pregnancy Panopticon
Women’s health is big business. There are a staggering number of applications for Android and iOS which claim to help people keep track of their monthly cycle, know when they may be fertile, or track the status of their pregnancy. These apps entice the user to input the most intimate...
Crossing the U.S. Border? Here’s How to Securely Wipe Your Computer
Many people crossing the U.S. border are concerned about the amount of power that the government has asserted to search and examine travelers’ possessions, including searching through or copying contents of digital devices, like photos, emails, and browsing history. The frequency of these intrusive practices has been increasing over...
Global Condemnation for Turkey's Detention of Innocent Digital Security Trainers
The detention of a group of human rights defenders in Turkey for daring to learn about digital security and encryption continued last week with a brief appearance of the accused in an Istanbul court. Six were returned to jail, and four released on bail. In an additionally absurd twist, the...
RCEP Discussions on Ecommerce: Gathering Steam in Hyderabad
Sixteen countries from Asia-Pacific are meeting in Hyderabad for the 19th round of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) which takes place in India from 18-28 July, 2017. EFF is participating to advocate for improved transparency and openness in the negotiations, and to express our concerns about possible new rules...
