e>EFF in the News
EFF in the News: July 2006July 31, 2006
Associated Press
"Bush administration appeals domestic spying decision"
The Bush administration is appealing a ruling that allowed a lawsuit to go forward challenging the president's warrantless domestic spying program...
The San Francisco lawsuit was filed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation privacy group. It challenges President Bush's assertion that he can use his wartime powers to eavesdrop on Americans without a warrant.
July 31, 2006
Fox News
"Fingerprints Replacing Credit Cards at Retail Stores"
By Michael Y. Park
When students living in Berkeley, Calif., crave a chicken burrito with an extra heaping of guacamole at High Tech Burrito, a Bay Area-based fast-food chain, they need to remember to bring only two things — an empty stomach and a forefinger...
Lee Tien, a senior staff attorney at the San Francisco-based Electronic Frontier Foundation, had a similar concern.
"So you lose your keys," said Tien. "You get another key and you change your locks, and you're back to where you were before. If your credit card number is stolen, you get another credit card and revoke the old one. You can't do that with biometrics. At a certain point, you're running out of fingers."
July 29, 2006
Austin American-Statesman
"Recording industry sues 11 in Central Texas for illegal downloads"
By Claudia Grisales
Samuel Tullos says he remembers downloading "Love You Down" by Ready for the World and "So What'cha Want" by the Beastie Boys. But the Pflugerville resident said he did not know it would come back to haunt him more than a year later...
"This is just an unfair system," Jeschke said. "Millions of people trade files online. This invariably singles out people that can't afford to pay.
"If they are really interested in getting these artists paid for their work, this is not going to do it," she said.
July 27, 2006
Sci-Tech Today
"YouTube Model Raises Copyright Concerns"
When YouTube was sued on July 14 for copyright infringement, the shock wasn't that the video-sharing service was being yanked into court. Questions had been swirling for months about whether the upstart, which now dishes up 100 million daily videos, was crossing copyright boundaries by letting its members upload videos with little oversight...
"There has to be some way to make money with advertising that doesn't deprive you of the safe harbor. But where that line is, no one really knows," says Fred von Lohmann, a lawyer for the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
July 27, 2006
AFP
"'Links are really the whole enchilada' on the internet"
By Glenn Chapman
Key internet freedoms are under threat in a legal battle between online search leader Google and pornography publisher Perfect 10, a prominent internet rights foundation said on Wednesday...
"The stakes are high and everybody is out expressing an opinion," said EFF attorney Fred von Lohmann. "Links are really the whole enchilada when it comes to the worldwide web."
July 27, 2006
CIOL - IT Unlimited
"Internet is pulling ahead of censors"
By Shashwat Chaturvedi
It is not the first time that the Internet was gagged, and certainly not the last. Far too many governments, regimes, authorities, and others have at one time or the other soiled their hands while attempting to restrict the free-flow of information in the cyberspace...
Shashwat Chaturvedi from CyberMedia News interacted with the co-founder of EFF and board member, John Gilmore on the various issues that surround the debate of Internet and censorship. Gilmore describes himself as an entrepreneur and civil libertarian. He is a technology veteran and quite an authority on issues related to, well, technology and liberty as well.
July 27, 2006
Wall Street Journal
"Friendster Patent on Linking Web Friends Could Hurt Rivals"
By Vauhini Vara
Friendster Inc., known for bringing people together, could wind up making enemies among its peers...
Some are skeptical of Friendster's claims. "People have been stalking each other on the Internet for years -- from Google vanity searches to lurking on somebody's blog reading what your ex is doing these days," says Jason Schultz, an attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
July 27, 2006
MIT Technology Review
"DRM Under Siege: The Yahoo Music Experiment"
By Wade Roush
There's something noteworthy about the digital download version of "A Public Affair," the latest single from pop star Jessica Simpson...
This is a sign that the enthusiasm for DRM is beginning to wane in the music industry," says Fred von Lohmann, a senior staff attorney and intellectual-property expert at the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) in San Francisco. "I certainly don't expect DRM to disappear overnight. But I would not be surprised if you saw specific genres or subsidiaries of the major labels experimenting with more unprotected MP3s."
July 26, 2006
Ars Technica
"Activism makes a difference in California copyright fight"
By Nate Anderson
If the MPAA's ill-fated What's the Diff? campaign taught us anything, it's that the boardroom is not the place to be crafting hip titles. Educators and technology enthusiasts both derided the curriculum for an inaccurate and simplistic presentation of copyright law, while others found the intrusion of corporate interests into grade schools just as alarming. Whether it's Captain Copyright or What's the Diff?, entertainment industry curricula are "not just biased, but just sometimes flat-out wrong about what the law says," according to the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF).
July 26, 2006
UPI
"Feds move to stop Mo. probe into AT&T"
The Bush administration went to court in a bid to halt an effort by two Missouri state regulators to find out whether AT&T turned over telephone records...
Privacy advocates won in California last week when a federal judge refused a Justice Department request to dismiss a suit brought by the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
July 26, 2006
TechNewsWorld
"Sides Line Up in Google-Perfect 10 Fight"
By John P. Mello Jr.
Allies have begun taking sides in a court case that has far-reaching implications for the Internet. At stak is a practice at the heart of the Net: linking information between Web sites...
The latest groups to trumpet Google's side in the case are the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and the Library Copyright Alliance, a group of library associations.
July 26, 2006
Providence Journal
"3 in R.I. charged with online piracy"
By Edward Fitzpatrick
In February, someone from the recording industry began calling Stephen and Patricia Hereth's house in Pawtucket, accusing them of violating copyright laws by downloading music and sharing it with other people...
"This has been a massive and consistent campaign, with really no end in sight, going after ordinary Americans, and it really doesn't provide a solution," said Derek Slater, spokesman for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a "digital rights" advocacy group based in San Francisco.
A staff attorney for the group, Jason Schultz, said, "There is no empirical evidence that the suits are doing anything to stop file sharing. The numbers continue to rise."
July 21, 2006
Slate
By Patrick Radden Keefe
Until Thursday, the NSA wiretapping scandal had gone remarkably well for the Bush administration...
But that all changed when a federal judge in San Francisco on Thursday issued a ruling on an obscure procedural point in a court case between the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a digital rights nonprofit, and AT&T.
July 21, 2006
Revolution Portal
"Yahoo And Sony Offering DRM-Free MP3's"
By Victor D'Angelo
Yahoo and Sony will be selling MP3's at a higher price but will be DRM free allowing them to play on any mp3 player regardless of the brand...
"It's about time," says Fred von Lohmann, a senior attorney with the public interest group Electronic Frontier Foundation. "This is an important signal that the labels may be finally realizing that DRM is hindering the size of the market."
July 21, 2006
Wausau Daily Herald
"Another View: Internet freedom"
Sixteen years ago today, a group you've never heard of was created to protect you from threats you didn't know existed.
Odds are, you're still in the dark about the Electronic Frontier Foundation. But you've learned about some of the threats — threats that continue to multiply despite 16 years of EFF challenges and lawsuits.
July 21, 2006
Washington Post
"Judge Declines to Dismiss Lawsuit Against AT&T"
By Arshad Mohammed
A federal judge yesterday rejected the government's effort to throw out a lawsuit about its warrantless surveillance program, arguing that a dismissal of the case would restrict civil liberties without strengthening national security.
The class-action suit against AT&T Inc., filed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation in January, alleges that the nation's largest phone company collaborated with the federal government in an illegal domestic spying program to monitor Americans' phone calls and e-mails.
July 21, 2006
New York Times
"Judge Declines to Dismiss Privacy Suit Against AT&T"
By John Markoff
A federal judge on Thursday rejected a motion by the Bush administration to dismiss a lawsuit against AT&T over its cooperation with a government surveillance program, ruling that state secrets would not be at risk if the suit proceeded. The case was filed in February by the Electronic Frontier Foundation...
July 20, 2006
Wired
By Ryan Singel
In a landmark ruling Thursday, a federal judge forcefully refused to dismiss a civil liberties group's lawsuit against AT&T for its alleged complicity in widespread warrantless government surveillance, despite the government's argument that the suit could reveal state secrets -- a rarely used claim that nearly always terminates a lawsuit...
The decision marks a significant victory for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and puts a rare limitation on the reach of the president's "state secrets privilege" to sweep alleged illegal government activities under the cloak of national security.
July 20, 2006
CNET
"Judge refuses to drop spying suit against AT&T"
By Anne Broache
A federal judge rejected on Thursday both the U.S. government's and AT&T's requests to dismiss a class action suit accusing the telephone giant of assisting the National Security Agency in a sweeping, allegedly illegal terrorist surveillance program...
The Electronic Frontier Foundation, a San Francisco-based civil liberties group, filed the suit in January, charging that AT&T had opened up its telecommunications facilities to the NSA for use in spying on the phone calls and e-mails of "millions of ordinary Americans."
July 20, 2006
Red Herring
"Judge Nixes NSA Secret Status"
A federal judge on Thursday rejected the U.S. government's motion that a legal challenge of its warrantless electronic spying could reveal state secrets and harm national security, so the case will continue in open court.
The lawsuit, filed in January by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, alleges that AT&T, the United States' largest phone company, collaborated with the National Security Agency to illegally spy on millions of ordinary Americans, under the cover of the war on terrorism.
July 20, 2006
IDG
"Wiretapping suit against AT&T can go forward"
By Stephen Lawson
A federal judge on Thursday denied motions by the U.S. government and AT&T Corp. to stop a lawsuit over alleged participation by the carrier in an illegal wiretapping program by the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA)...
The civil liberties group Electronic Frontier Foundation sued AT&T in January on behalf of the carrier's customers, alleging it diverts traffic from its fiber-optic lines to the NSA as part of an illegal antiterrorist surveillance program.
July 20, 2006
KTVU
"Judge Denies Feds Attempt To Dismiss AT&T Domestic Spying Lawsuit"
A federal judge Thursday refused to dismiss a lawsuit challenging the Bush administration's domestic spying program, rejecting government claims that allowing the case to go forward could expose state secrets and jeopardize the war on terror...
And in declining to dismiss AT&T Inc. from the lawsuit, filed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation privacy group, Walker suggested the case had some merit. "AT&T cannot seriously contend that a reasonable entity in its position could have believed that the alleged domestic dragnet was legal," he wrote.
July 20, 2006
NPR
Audio: "The Technology of Biometics"
Let me go to an opposition point of view. The Electronic Frontier Foundation, or EFF, is a non profit watchdog...
July 20, 2006
Bay City News
"Attorney Hopes SF Judge's Decision on Spying Halts Congress"
An Electronic Frontier Foundation attorney hopes today's decision by a federal judge in a lawsuit against the Bush administration's domestic eavesdropping program will derail efforts to have the program's constitutionality decided by a secret federal court...
Foundation attorney Cindy Cohn wants Congress to take notice of Walker's decision. It is currently considering a bill by Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., that would allow questions about the program's constitutionality to be decided by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which is closed to the public.
July 20, 2006
San Francisco Chronicle
"Judge won't dismiss suit over domestic spying"
By Bob Egelko
A federal judge in San Francisco refused today to dismiss a privacy-rights group's lawsuit against AT&T for allegedly cooperating in illegal government electronic surveillance of U.S. citizens, and flatly rejected the Bush administration's claims that such litigation threatens national security...
The suit was filed in January by the Electronic Frontier Foundation as a proposed class action on behalf of all AT&T customers.
July 20, 2006
UPI
"Judge refuses to dismiss wiretapping suit"
A federal judge in San Francisco Thursday denied a motion to dismiss the Electronic Frontier Foundation's lawsuit against AT&T over warrantless wiretapping.
July 20, 2006
Associated Press
"Judge Refuses to Dismiss Spying Lawsuit"
By David Kravets
A federal judge Thursday rejected a government request that he dismiss a lawsuit challenging the Bush administration's domestic spying program...
The EFF plans on asking Walker soon to rule on whether the president possesses wartime powers to authorize warrantless eavesdropping in the United States. The EFF alleges that San Antonio-based AT&T, which neither confirms nor denies the allegations, practices "wholesale surveillance" of its customers.
July 20, 2006
Dow Jones
"Judge Denies AT&T, US Motion To Dismiss Case"
By Roger Cheng
A district judge denied a request by AT&T Inc. and the U.S. government to dismiss a lawsuit alleging the two had illegally tracked domestic and foreign telephone calls.
"The court denies the government's motion to dismiss...on the basis of state secrets and denies AT&T's motion to dismiss," U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker said in a court order filed Thursday.The lawsuit, filed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, accuses AT&T of illegally working with the National Security Agency to eavesdrop and track phone calls without warrants.
July 20, 2006
BBC
"How to blog - and keep your job"
By Laura Smith-Spark
A British secretary allegedly sacked from her job in Paris over an internet diary is the latest in a growing line to pay a heavy price for blogging...
The Electronic Frontier Foundation, a website supporting bloggers' legal rights, has published detailed tips on how to stay anonymous and advises against blogging in work time.
But, it warns, increasing scrutiny means "you can no longer safely assume that people in your offline life won't find out about your blog, if you ever could".
July 20, 2006
San Mateo County Times
By Todd R. Brown
From the outside, YouTube's second-story office on Third Street is the essence of nondescript: There's no sign, no reception desk, just a glass door manned by a security guard and a stairway...
"YouTube enjoys the protection of something called the 'online service provider safe harbors,'" said Fred von Lohmann, senior staff attorney for EFF. "It's the same rule that protects GeoCities and Verio and eBay, and all of the online services which essentially host material on behalf of their customers."
July 19, 2006
NPR
Audio: "Invoking the State Secrets Privilege"
The Electronic Frontier Foundation is suing AT&T...
July 19, 2006
Slate
"Presidential Power on Steroids"
By Patrick Radden Keefe
Last week, headlines suggested that Sen. Arlen Specter had reached a compromise with the White House to ensure that the warrantless surveillance program conducted by the National Security Agency—which Congress has refused to investigate—might at least be evaluated by the courts...
The strongest of these challenges is a case brought by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a digital-rights nonprofit, against AT&T. It alleges that the telecom giant broke the law by secretly cooperating with the NSA. EFF has what other plaintiffs lack: an AT&T whistleblower named Mark Klein, who can testify about a secret room that NSA operates at an AT&T hub in San Francisco. But even if it overcomes the government's state secrets hurdle, EFF's case could now be pre-empted by a provision in Specter's bill that allows the attorney general to move any legal challenges to NSA surveillance to the secret FISA court.
July 19, 2006
Red Herring
The effort of the U.S. Attorney General to soothe Congressional anger over the Bush administration's warrantless wiretapping fell far short, as a powerful congressman called it an effort to deprive American citizens of their right to legally challenge government...
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), one of the groups that filed a legal challenge to the government's wiretapping plan, called the bill a sham and a rubber stamp acceptance of any surveillance program dreamt up by the administration.
July 17, 2006
SecurityProNews
"Torpark Provides Route Around India Censors"
By David Utter
India's Department of Telecommunications has ordered Internet service providers to block several websites, including Blogger, Geocities, and Typepad...
Another commenter noted how the Torpark project could help Internet users in India get around the blocks. If nothing else, the existence of Torpark would render India's decree moot if it works as advertised.
Torpark is a small executable file that creates a secure Internet connection via the Tor network, an anonymous communication system supported by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, among others.
July 17, 2006
ZDNET
"Critics blast bill proposing NSA spy changes"
By Anne Broache
Criticism is growing of a proposed law touted by a Republican senator and the White House as a compromise solution to the ongoing controversy over the National Security Agency's electronic surveillance program...
Electronic Frontier Foundation staff attorney Kevin Bankston deemed Specter's draft measure "a rubber stamp for any future spying program dreamed up by the executive," saying it "threatens to make court oversight of electronic surveillance voluntary rather than mandatory."
July 17, 2006
Richmond Times-Dispatch
"NAACP head decries war at convention"
A highlight of yesterday's conference activities was the continuing legal-education series, which covered topics ranging from the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to the composition of Congress...
The Transportation Security Administration's proposed passenger-prescreening process and the government's use of watch lists and surveillance are disturbing, said David Sobel, a lawyer with the Electronic Frontier Foundation in San Francisco.
"Having one's name on a list has greater ramifications than merely increased security at airports," he said. "It could lead to severe rights violations."
July 15, 2006
San Francisco Chronicle
"Secret court may end up hearing AT&T illegal surveillance lawsuit"
By Bob Egelko
A lawsuit in San Francisco federal court accusing AT&T of illegally collaborating with the Bush administration's electronic surveillance of U.S. citizens would be transferred to a secret court accessible only to the government under new legislation backed by the White House...
"The government has a stacked deck and may be the only meaningful party in the litigation'' if Specter's bill becomes law, Kevin Bankston, a lawyer with the Electronic Frontier Foundation in San Francisco, said Friday.
July 15, 2006
Indianapolis Star
"Gracenote strikes deal on lyrics"
By Erika D. Smith
The deal is music to Scott Jones' ears. The Indianapolis entrepreneur's company, Gracenote, has signed an agreement with hundreds of music publishers to offer song lyrics over the Web.
"Music lyrics are available, they have been available, and no number of lawsuits is going to change that," said Fred von Lohmann, an attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
July 15, 2006
New York Times
"Critics of Wiretapping Oppose a Plan for a Decision on the Program by a Secret Court"
By Eric Lichtblau
Critics of the Bush administration's program for wiretapping without warrants said Friday that they would fight a new White House agreement to let a secret court decide the constitutionality of the operation, and the compromise plan failed to deter lawmakers from offering up competing proposals of their own.
July 14, 2006
Red Herring
The group that filed a legal challenge to the U.S. government's wiretapping plan on Friday published a copy of a "sham" bill that was quietly drafted as part of a compromise between the White House and a powerful Republican senator...
"This so-called compromise bill is not a concession from the White House—it's a rubber stamp for any future spying program dreamed up by the executive [branch],ves up on hunt for moles"
Apple has ended its legal fight to make bloggers reveal who leaked secret information about its new products...
The case went to appeal and the 2004 decision was over-turned in May 2006 with the help of digital rights group the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF).
July 13, 2006
San Jose Mercury News"Bush agrees to have domestic eavesdropping program reviewed"
By Jonathan S. Landay
In a policy reversal, President Bush has agreed to sign legislation allowing a secret federal court to assess the constitutionality of his warrantless domestic eavesdropping program, a senior Republican senator announced Thursday...
Lee Tien, an attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a civil liberties group that's suing AT&T over its cooperation with the NSA program, called the bill "terrible" in part because it provides no opportunity for outside attorneys to contest the program's legality before FISA court.
"This bill says nothing about how any outsider or the folks that we represent would have any kind of a voice in this," he said. "It's almost alien to the concept of judicial review in this country."
July 13, 2006
Computerworld"Senators call for more RFID education"
By Grant Gross
Two members of the U.S. Senate launched an RFID (radio frequency identification) caucus Thursday, with the purpose of educating lawmakers on the benefits of the expanding technology...
Privacy advocates such as the American Civil Liberties Union and the Electronic Frontier Foundation have raised concerns about RFID, which uses small computer chips and antennas that are integrated into paper or plastic labels.
July 13, 2006
San Francisco Chronicle"Apple won't pursue source of leak"
By Ellen Lee
Apple Computer Inc. will not go after the name of the source who leaked secret company information to bloggers last year...
The Electronic Frontier Foundation, which had challenged an Apple lawsuit, said the decision means that bloggers and other online journalists have the same right to protect their sources as traditional reporters.
July 13, 2006
Wired NewsBy Rachel Metz
The owners of the domain adsense.com have been fielding hundreds of customer service e-mails and phone calls regarding Google's AdSense program since the advertising service launched in March 2003...
Not registering a trademark with the federal registry doesn't mean a business is powerless, said Corynne McSherry, a staff attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation. But that can make it difficult to go after a business that has the same name trademarked.
"If you have an unregistered mark you've been using for years and someone else has a registered mark, you might pursue an unfair-competition claim," she said.
July 12, 2006
CNET"Apple abandons effort to unmask leaker"
By Declan McCullagh
Apple Computer has abandoned a high-profile legal effort to unmask whoever leaked details about a still-unreleased music accessory...
Kurt Opsahl, a staff attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a digital rights group in San Francisco that is defending the Web publishers, said this decision could prove influential.
"This issue is likely to come up in other jurisdictions," Opsahl said.
July 12, 2006
Macworld"Apple won't appeal case against online journalists"
By Jim Dalrymple
Apple Computer will not appeal a decision that favored the reporters of two Internet Web sites to obtain communications of allegedly leaked information. The Electronic Frontier Foundation confirmed in court documents on Wednesday that Apple would not pursue the case.
July 11, 2006
San Jose Mercury News
"SF reviews contracts with AT&T over domestic spying"
By Scott LindlawCity officials are examining San Francisco's telecommunications contracts with AT&T Inc. and whether to take action against the company for its alleged cooperation with the National Security Agency, Mayor Gavin Newsom said Tuesday...
A federal lawsuit filed by Internet privacy advocate Electronic Frontier Foundation accuses the telecommunications giant of illegally cooperating with the NSA to make communications on AT&T networks available to the spy agency without warrants.
July 11, 2006
Christian Science Monitor
"It's a kite. It's a model airplane. It's the sherriff!"
By Daniel B. WoodIt looks like a model plane, and sounds nearly silent. It costs $30,000, and could pay for itself in its first hour of use...
"What concerns us is that privacy is fundamentally a right to be let alone and go about your business and daily life without having the government looking over your shoulders," says Kurt Opsahl, staff attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a nonprofit organization, which aims to protect people's digital rights. "It is as disturbing if they are looking over your shoulder with a drone flying overhead as much as over your shoulder literally," he says.
July 10, 2006
CNET
"Newsmaker: Have patent, will sue"
By Charles CooperPaul Ryan runs what is by most definitions a patent powerhouse--and a controversial one, at that...
But Acacia's activities have inevitably raised hackles in some quarters of the technology business. The Electronic Frontier Foundation, for instance, has lampooned Acacia on its Web site for "crimes against the public domain" because of what the Internet rights organization terms "laughably broad patents."
July 10, 2006
Los Angeles Times
"Republican Complains of Secrecy"
By Jim Puzzanghera and T. Christian MillerA high-ranking Republican lashed out at President Bush on Sunday, suggesting that the White House may have broken the law by failing to inform Congress of a "major" intelligence program and other undercover activities...
Lee Tien, a senior staff attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a civil liberties group, said in an interview Sunday that he was not surprised that other intelligence programs were operating outside of congressional oversight.
"What I should do is expect that anything I can think of that would be a useful unconstitutional operation is already taking place, and it's just a matter of when we learn about it," said Tien, whose group is suing AT&T for sharing customers' calling records with the National Security Agency for the administration's domestic surveillance program.
July 6, 2006
E-Commerce Times
"Judge, Government Wrangle Over Phone Privacy"
By John P. Mello Jr.A federal judge in Houston and the U.S. Attorney's office for that region are wrangling over just how much information the government can garner from a phone call without a warrant for a wiretap...
"You can't get post-cut-through digits with a pen/trap order," Lee Tien, a staff attorney for Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), told the E-Commerce Times. "If you want to get those kinds of digits, you need a wiretap order, just as if you wanted to listen to a conversation."
July 6, 2006
USA TODAY
"With only a letter, FBI can gather private data"
By Richard WillingWhen the FBI office in New Haven, Conn., received an e-mail in February 2005 that looked like a terrorist threat, agents followed a familiar routine. They asked the service provider, a group of Connecticut public libraries, for the real name, street address and Internet logs of the sender...
Lee Tien, an attorney with the San Francisco-based Electronic Frontier Foundation, a privacy advocacy group that opposed many elements of the Patriot Act, says the secrecy requirement contained in the law makes it impossible for the public to know how intrusive the letters are or how often they help stop terrorists.
July 6, 2006
Press Enterprise (Riverside, CA)
"Increased School Surveillance in Offing"Beaumont students might find themselves humming along with Kenneth Gordy's hit song, "Somebody's Watching Me," which was released, perhaps fittingly, in 1984...
To justify surveillance cameras, schools should seek to prevent something specific rather than just recording students because they can, said Lee Tien, senior staff attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a nonprofit group that seeks to protect the pub- lic's technology-related rights.
July 5, 2006
Joystiq
"Nintendo, a top 10 patent abuser"The Electronic Frontier Foundation, looking to defend freedom in the digital world, has listed the top 10 most bogus software patents. Making the list is Sheldon F. Goldberg (online gaming), Acceris (VoIP), and the House that Mario Built.
Nintendo's faux pas patent has to do with software emulation. Jason Schultz, EFF's staff attorney, accuses Nintendo of being "a big bully" against small game companies writing computer emulators.
July 4, 2006
Associated Press
Sidebar: "EFF prefers battling in courts, not Congress"
By Anick JesdanunA year after moving its headquarters to Washington, D.C., the Electronic Frontier Foundation was already in the hot seat...
"It's in the nature of Washington organisations to regard keeping a place at the table with paramount interest," EFF co-founder and board member John Perry Barlow said. "You know you're going to deal with them another day, and you're very inclined to compromise, make deals."
July 4, 2006
Associated Press
Timeline: "The Electronic Frontier Foundation at 16""Each new technology shifts the power structures. It takes what used to be a well-understood playing field and makes part of it no man's land again. Those unsettled areas can either settle out in ways that provide freedom and egalitarian opportunities or they can settle out in a way that says these guys who got there first are going to own the area for all of eternity. ... I'm just glad that working together with the EFF and through members and collaborators that we were able to push back those boundaries to make sure that in large parts of technology, freedom is still the rule."
--John Gilmore, EFF co-founder and board member.
July 4, 2006
Associated Press
"EFF defends traditional liberties in high-tech world"
By Anick JesdanunIn March 1990, when few people had even heard of the Internet, U.S. Secret Service agents raided the Texas offices of a small board-game maker, seizing computer equipment and reading customers' e-mail stored on one machine...
"It's difficult at this stage of the game to remember how few people even knew the Internet existed," said John Perry Barlow, a co-founder who used to write lyrics for the Grateful Dead. "It wasn't on their radar."
July 3, 2006
Red Herring
"Keying in on Phone Spying"A Texas judge sought help from a technology rights group in a case in which the United States government is seeking to gain access to personal information keyed into phones, such as bank account numbers and prescription refill data, without a warrant, the group said Monday...
"After the phone call has been connected, the pen/trap device's job is over," said EFF senior staff attorney Lee Tien. "The numbers that you enter through the keypad to fill a prescription or join a meeting are just like the words or pass codes you say when there's no keypad option."
July 3, 2006
BusinessWeek
"Inside Nathan Myhrvold's Mysterious New Idea Machine"A rocket scientist, a mathematician, a brain surgeon, and a lawyer walk into a room. It sounds like the beginning of a joke, but at Intellectual Ventures it's something more serious—a business model...
Jason Schultz, a lawyer at the Electronic Frontier Foundation in San Francisco, who spoke on behalf of the CPF, criticizes IV for its secrecy about such things as the identity of its investors. "Having injected themselves into this debate about patent trolls and patent reform, they've sort of placed their credibility on the line," Schultz says. "So transparency is important."
