EFFector 36.2
Voting Against the Surveillance State | EFFector Volume 36, Issue 2
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In our 804th issue:
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Top Features
San Francisco voters will confront a looming threat to their privacy and civil liberties on the March 5, 2024 ballot. If Proposition E passes, we can expect the San Francisco Police Department will use untested and potentially dangerous technology on the public, any time they want, for a full year without oversight.
A new report reveals that in just three months, from July 1 to September 30, 2023, the San Francisco Police Department (SFPD) racked up 193 hours and 19 minutes of live access to non-city surveillance cameras. That means for the equivalent of 8 days, police sat behind a desk and tapped into hundreds of cameras, ostensibly including San Francisco’s extensive semi-private security camera networks, to watch city residents, workers, and visitors live. An article by the San Francisco Chronicle analyzing the report also uncovered that the SFPD tapped into these cameras to watch 42 hours of live footage during the Outside Lands music festival.
EFF Updates
Amazon’s Ring has announced that it will no longer facilitate police's warrantless requests for footage from Ring users. This is a victory in a long fight, not just against blanket police surveillance, but also against a culture in which private, for-profit companies build special tools to allow law enforcement to more easily access companies’ users and their data—all of which ultimately undermine their customers’ trust.
California Attorney General Rob Bonta should crack down on police agencies that still violate Californians’ privacy by sharing automated license plate reader information with out-of-state government agencies, putting abortion seekers and providers at particular risk, EFF and the state’s ACLU affiliates urged in a letter to Bonta.
Our government shouldn’t be spying on journalists. Nor should law enforcement agencies force journalists to identify their confidential sources or go to prison. To fix this, we need to change the law. Now, we’ve got our best chance in years. The House of Representatives has passed the Protect Reporters from Exploitive State Spying (PRESS) Act, H.R. 4250, and it’s one of the strongest federal shield bills for journalists we’ve seen.
Amid reports that X—the site formerly known as Twitter—is dropping in value, hindering how people use the site, and engaging in controversial account removals, it has never been more precarious to rely on the site as a historical record. So, it’s important for individuals to act now and save what they can. We’ll tell you how.
You may have heard recently that Apple is planning to implement Rich Communication Services (RCS) on iPhones, once again igniting the green versus blue bubble debate. RCS will thankfully bring a number of long-missing features to those green bubble conversations in Messages, but Apple's proposed implementation has a murkier future when it comes to security.
Here’s an audio version of EFFector. We hope you enjoy it!
Announcements
We’re honored to announce that EFF’s “How to Fix the Internet” podcast is a winner in the Anthem Awards! By amplifying the voices that spark global change, the Anthem Awards — presented by the International Academy of Digital Arts & Sciences — seek to inspire others to take action in their own community. That’s exactly why we launched “How to Fix the Internet;” through curious conversations with some of the leading minds in law and technology, we want our listeners to become deeply informed on vital technology issues and join the movement working to build a better technological future. We offer our deepest thanks to the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation's Program in Public Understanding of Science and Technology, our partners at Pacific Content, and all the amazing thinkers, makers, and doers who have been our guests. We’re about to launch Season 5, with guests including Taiwan Minister of Digital Affairs Audrey Tang, U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden, D-OR, documentary filmmaker Alex Winter, and many more — so subscribe today!
Register now to join EFF’s Cindy Cohn; Carrie DeCell, senior staff attorney at the Knight First Amendment Institute; Ben Wizner, director of the ACLU's Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project; and Trevor Timm, executive director of Freedom of the Press Foundation at 12:30pm EST this Thursday, Feb. 15 for a virtual panel discussion on how the Julian Assange prosecution endangers all journalists. Whether you love or hate Assange, the Espionage Act case against the Wikileaks publisher for printing government secrets in 2010 poses an extreme risk to press freedom. With the U.K. high court scheduled later this month to hear what could be Assange's final appeal before he's extradited to the United States, the threat to journalists is high.
EFF is happy to be back at CactusCon for their 12th event, Feb. 16 and 17 in Mesa, AZ! We'll be at the conference with an info booth, so be sure to stop by and chat with our team and learn about the latest developments in the fight for digital freedoms. We're excited to say hi to new and returning faces and answer any questions about our work! Of course, you can also pick up a special gift as a token of our thanks when you take advantage of our membership specials or donate! We'll even have various swag, like stickers, pins, hoodies, and more.
Job Openings
EFF is seeking an experienced manager to support our Public Interest Technology team of ethical technologists. If you're eager to utilize your management skills and technical knowledge to make a significant impact on the future of digital rights, this is the opportunity for you. In this position, you will play a crucial role in supporting EFF’s Public Interest Technology (PIT) efforts, addressing critical digital rights issues such as censorship, surveillance, and encryption. You will lead a small team of technologists developing robust research frameworks and technical policy approaches. And you will have opportunities to contribute to EFF’s programmatic cross-team working groups and public-facing initiatives.
EFF is seeking a Staff Technologist to join our Public Interest Technology team. This team consists of ethical technologists focused on defending encryption, outwitting censors and trackers, and leading the way towards a better digital future. This position will primarily focus on developing one of our open source software projects, a browser extension called Privacy Badger which is used by several million people around the world to help fight pervasive non-consensual surveillance online. When users choose Privacy Badger, they’re not just installing another ad blocker; they’re joining the movement to bring about the end of data brokers and targeted advertising, and we are looking for a technologist to play a key role in getting us there.
MiniLinks
EFF’s Katharine Trendacosta says we’ll see “the unstoppable movement of the Swifties versus the immovable object that is the legislature,” a Congress slow to respond to “basically anything.” But taking a measured approach to AI legislation is best, especially if existing laws can address the problems.
EFF’s David Greene joins the Knight First Amendment Institute’s Alex Abdo and the American Enterprise Institute’s Clay Calvert to explore key cases before the Supreme Court that have raised important questions at the intersection of technology and law.
Axon, maker of Tasers and police body cameras, has bought AI surveillance company Fusus. Local governments should ensure privacy-invasive data collection and tools aren’t adopted by bureaucracy instead of careful public review, EFF’s Beryl Lipton said.
Investigators believe this new DNA process has huge potential to solve cases involving missing Indigenous people, but EFF’s Jennifer Lynch warns this data is so sensitive that it should be protected by the Fourth Amendment, which guards against unreasonable search and seizure.
Executives from the top social media companies faced contentious, sometimes contemptuous, questioning from the US Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday in a hearing titled: Big Tech and the Online Child Sexual Exploitation Crisis. In anticipation of the hearing, several advocacy groups including EFF wrote to the Committee to warn that, "some of the legislative proposals before the Senate including STOP CSAM Act of 2023, EARN IT Act of 2023, and KOSA 2023 bear this risk and threaten to jeopardize all internet users’ access to information and privacy."
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