Free Speech Advocates Blast Amazon Over Threats Against Signal

On Tuesday, Moxie Marlinspike, founder of the secure messaging app Signal, posted a letter sent to him from Amazon threatening to suspend the company’s AWS account for using a technique called domain-fronting on its network. The technique is used to protect messages sent via the Signal’s messagin...

New Rules Announced for Border Inspection of Electronic Devices

The U.S. Customs and Border Patrol announced new restrictions on when agents can copy data from digital devices at border crossing points. Agents now need “reasonable suspicion” in advance of searches of phones, computers, tablets, cameras or any other digital device belonging to people entering ...

Facebook, Twitter and Instagram Share Data with Location-based Social Media Surveillance Startup

Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, VK, Google's Picasa and Youtube were handing over user data access to a Chicago-based Startup — the developer of a social media monitoring tool — which then sold this data to law enforcement agencies for surveillance purposes, the ACLU disclosed Tuesday. Government...

Signal is Most Secure Messenger, 'Useless Data' Obtained by FBI Proves It All

Do you trust your messaging app even though it uses end-to-end encryption? As I previously said end-to-end encryption doesn't mean that your messages are secure enough to hide your trace. It's because most of the messaging apps still record and store a lot of metadata on your calls and messages...

Court's Ruling a 'Clear Signal' About Mass Surveillance Programs, Experts Say

The ruling last week by the Second Circuit Court of Appeals that the NSA’s years-long bulk collection of phone metadata is illegal is a “clear signal” that courts are moving in the direction of striking down some mass surveillance programs, experts say. The decision, issued Thursday, is among the...

Appeals Court Rules NSA Metadata Collection Not Authorized by Section 215

The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ruled Thursday that the Patriot Act does not authorize the bulk collection of phone records by the NSA. The ruling undermines the key foundation upon which the federal government’s phone metadata surveillance program is built, Section 215 ...

New Coalition Launches Fight Against Patriot Act Section 215

A broad group of civil-rights, technology and political groups from across the spectrum has developed a new initiative to advocate for the repeal of Section 215 of the USA PATRIOT Act, the part that provides the authority for the bulk collection of phone metadata and other information. The new...

EFF, ACLU, Other NGOs Urging U.N. to Create Privacy Watchdog

A coalition of 63 non-governmental organizations NGOs from around the world are calling on national governments to support the establishment of a special rapporteur on the right to privacy within the United Nations. According to U.N. documents, special rapporteurs also known as special procedures...

Academics Call for End to Mass Surveillance

A group of hundreds of academics from countries around the world have started a petition that demands Western governments, such as those in the United States and UK, stop the mass surveillance programs they have in place and “effectively protect everyone’s fundamental rights and freedoms”. The...

NSA Bulk Telephony Metadata Collection Program Legal

A federal court today shot down a challenge by the American Civil Liberties Union ACLU to the National Security Agency’s bulk phone metadata collection program, determining that the spy agency’s actions are legal. The ruling by U.S. District Court judge William Pauley contradicts a Dec. 16 D.C...

House Rejects Amendment to Sever NSA Data Collection Funding

By a narrow dozen votes, the U.S. House of Representatives yesterday failed to pass an amendment to the Department of Defense Appropriations Act of 2014 that would have severed funding for the NSA’s phone record surveillance program turned out by Edward Snowden. The amendment, put forth by Rep...

DHS: Border Device Search Policy Does Not Violate Fourth Amendment

The Department of Homeland Security’s Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties CLCR has determined that the DHS’s warrantless, and often suspicion-less, search and seizure of electronics devices at U.S. borders does not violate the Fourth Amendment protection against unreasonable search or...

Chris Soghoian on Exploit Sales

Dennis Fisher talks with Chris Soghoian, a principal technologist at the ACLU, about the developing market for buying and selling exploits and vulnerabilities. Soghoian has been a vocal critic of exploit sales and in this podcast he discusses the reasons why and why he thinks the policymakers in...

Senator Seeks More Info On DOJ Location Tracking Practices

Senator Al Franken D-MN is demanding answers to questions about the U.S. Department of Justice DOJ practice of gathering data from wireless providers in order to monitor individuals’ movements using mobile phone location data. Franken released a copy of a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder on...