Intellectual Property Law

Legal Filesharing on Campus?

Posted on July 03, 2008
As EFF has been saying for years, the best way forward in the wars over illegal filesharing is the creation of a Voluntary Collective Licensing system. It sounds simple enough: Music fans would pay a small fee each month in exchange for a blanket license to share and download whatever they like...

Senator Hatch and Tinfoil Hats

Posted on July 03, 2008
Apparently no longer even bothering with coherent or rational arguments, supporters of the flawed surveillance bill have now resorted to namecalling. Here's Senator Orrin Hatch's argument in last Thursday's Senate debate. (h/t ThinkProgress) "How many times have we heard claims that the Protect America Act would permit the government to spy on innocent American families overseas, on their vacations? Or innocent American soldiers overseas serving their country? Or innocent American students who are simply studying abroad? Painting this type of picture only feeds the delusions of those who wear tinfoil hats around their house and think that Nine-Eleven was an inside job...

Breaking News: Court Holds That FISA Preempts State Secret Privilege

Posted on July 02, 2008
New NSA Spying Decision Undermines Arguments for Telecom Immunity Today, Chief Judge Vaughn Walker of the Northern District of California, issued an opinion in Al Haramain v. Bush, one of the cases challenging the NSA warrantless wiretapping program. The Court found that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) preempted the state secret privilege...

Court Ruling Will Expose Viewing Habits of YouTube Users

Posted on July 02, 2008
Yesterday, in the Viacom v. Google litigation, the federal court for the Southern District of New York ordered Google to produce to Viacom (over Google's objections): all data from the Logging database concerning each time a YouTube video has been viewed on the YouTube website or through embedding on a third-party website The court?s order grants Viacom's request and erroneously ignores the protections of the federal Video Privacy Protection Act (VPPA), and threatens to expose deeply private information about what videos are watched by YouTube users...

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European Lawmaker Sues U.S. Agencies to Obtain Travel-Related and Other Personal Information

Posted on July 01, 2008
Washington, D.C. - The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) filed suit on behalf of a member of the European Parliament today, demanding that the U.S. government release records about her "risk assessment" score and other information gathered about her during her international travels...

Surveilling Drivers For Safety, For The Environment, and For Profit

Posted on June 30, 2008
There is a growing movement to surveil the drivers of cars — for insurance purposes. One idea is that vehicle insurance premiums should depend on verifiable, periodic measurements of how far a car has been driven. The case for such premiums is strong: driving further clearly increases the risk of an accident, and "Pay As You Drive" premiums would allow (some) drivers to pay less for insurance; would allow insurance companies to make higher profits; and would reduce the congestion, greenhouse emission and traffic accident costs that each mile driven causes for society...

Global minilinks for 2008-06-30

Posted on June 30, 2008
Tor Project Blocked in China -- FinallyAfter years of aiding those seeking anonymity and bypassing censorship, Tor is finally blocked by the Great Firewall of China. China's Overeager American Censors"Practically every U.S.-owned search engine has caved to the Chinese government's demands that they censor political Web sites in China...

A Brief Reprieve on FISA: What Now?

Posted on June 27, 2008
Thursday evening, Senator Reid officially delayed a final vote on the FISA Amendments Act until July 8. That gave us just twelve days — now, eleven — to change the political calculus and avoid a Congressional seal of approval on illegal wiretapping...

EFF Supports Senator Bingaman's Immunity Amendment: Congress Should Know What It is Immunizing

Posted on June 27, 2008
The schedule for the Senate's return on July 8 allows for three amendments to be introduced to the FISA Amendments Act, which in its current form would grant immunity from the law to phone companies who engaged in illegal spying. One amendment, from Senators Dodd and Leahy, would strip immunity from the bill altogether...

minilinks for 2008-06-26

Posted on June 26, 2008
Schwarzenegger Asks ISPs to Block NewsgroupsThe California Governor and Attorney General have asked ISPs to jump on the newsgroup-blocking bandwagon -- an attempt to stop child porn that will likely block legitimate speech as well. Prince v. Tribute to PrinceA Norwegian tribute album featuring covers of Prince songs by various artists is the latest object of the musician's wrath...

Senate Delays Vote on Immunity

Posted on June 26, 2008
It's official: Thanks to overwhelming grassroots action, and the heroic efforts of Senators Dodd and Feingold, the Senate's vote on whether to grant phone companies immunity from the law for assisting in the President's illegal wiretapping program has been delayed until after July 4th Recess! This is an unexpected reprieve for civil liberties and the rule of law...

DNI and AG Fear Court Ruling on Warrantless Wiretapping

Posted on June 26, 2008
EFF and others have long suspected that one reason the White House and its allies have fought for telecom immunity so fervently has been their fear that a judicial ruling on the legality of telecoms' participation would lead to a ruling rejecting the legality of the Administration's warrantless wiretapping program itself...

Vote On Immunity Appears Imminent, But Anything Could Happen

Posted on June 25, 2008
There have been rumors that the Senate's vote on final passage of the FISA Amendments Act might be delayed until after next week's Congressional recess. Anything could happen, as the Senate is simultaneously rushing to complete two other controversial bills — one to address the mortage crisis, and another to fund the Iraq war — as quickly as possible...

Congress Must Investigate Privacy Violations at U.S. Borders

Posted on June 25, 2008
This morning, EFF Senior Staff Attorney Lee Tien testified in a Senate hearing on laptop searches and other privacy violations faced by Americans at the U.S. border. Lee's testimony [PDF] outlined the dangers of random and invasive searches of travelers' digital devices, and urged more congressional investigation and oversight...

Senators Dodd and Feingold Stand Strong Against Immunity

Posted on June 25, 2008
The Senate is once again arguing whether to pass The FISA Amendments Act, a deeply flawed and unconstitutional surveillance bill. Tuesday evening, Senator Dodd of Connecticut clarified what's at stake: This legislation includes provisions which would grant retroactive immunity to telecommunications companies that apparently have violated the privacy and the trust of millions of Americans by participating in the president?s warrantless wiretapping program...

Charter Communications ISP Halts Traffic Inspection/Advertising Plan

Posted on June 25, 2008
Privacy-minded consumers celebrated a victory as the ISP Charter Communications announced a decision to scuttle a controversial advertising plan that would have involved surveillance of customers' Internet traffic -- likely using an invasive technique called deep packet inspection...

EFF to Testify at Congressional Hearing on Electronic Searches at U.S. Borders

Posted on June 23, 2008
Washington, D.C. - On Wednesday, June 25, at 9 a.m., members of the U.S. Senate Judiciary hearing will hold a public hearing on laptop searches and other privacy violations faced by Americans at the U.S. border. Senior Staff Attorney Lee Tien of the Electronic Frontier Foundation will appear at Wednesday's hearing to urge more congressional investigation and oversight of the Department of Homeland Security's border search practices and policies...

Wanted: Prior Art to Bust Seer Patent

Posted on June 23, 2008
The Patent Busting Project fights back against bogus patents by filing requests for reexamination against the worst offenders. We've successfully pushed the Patent and Trademark Office to reexamine five of the ten patents on our Most Wanted list. We're proud to have tackled half of the list, but now we need your help to bust another...

EFF Releases Updated White Paper on Best Practices for Online Service Providers

Posted on June 20, 2008
Today EFF released a revised white paper on Best Practices for Online Service Providers, an update of the 2004 OSP Best Practices white paper. In the white paper, EFF offers some suggestions, both legal and technical, for the best privacy practices for collecting, storing and disclosing data that balance the needs of OSPs and their users' privacy and civil liberties...

House Falls Down on the Job

Posted on June 20, 2008
The House of Representatives today has fallen down on the job. By passing the FISA Amendments Act (293-129, with 105 Democrats in favor), they voted to give this lame duck President an undeserved parting gift by passing immunity for telcoms that helped the President violate the Constitution by participating in the NSA's massive and illegal spying program...

EFF Urges Judge to Grant New Trial for Jammie Thomas

Posted on June 20, 2008
San Francisco - The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and a coalition of consumer and industry groups have asked a judge to grant a new trial to Jammie Thomas, who was hit with a $222,000 judgment in a file-sharing lawsuit based in part on the recording industry's bogus "making available" theory...

House Caves, Approves Fake 'Compromise' on Telecom Immunity

Posted on June 20, 2008
Washington, D.C. - Privacy rights and the rule of law took a serious blow today when the House of Representatives passed blanket retroactive immunity for phone companies that participated in the president's warrantless surveillance program. The FISA Amendments Act, H...

Rebublican Senators: It's About Immunity

Posted on June 19, 2008
The dangerous and unconstitutional FISA bill coming up before the House Friday appears to have support, with Speaker Pelosi describing it as a "balanced bill". The bill is far from balanced when it comes to immunity for telecoms, as the bill was written to guarantee dismissal -- a fact the Speaker's Republican colleagues are quite up front about: House Minority Whip Roy Blunt, R-Mo...

Microsoft to MSN Music Customers: Your Music is Still Good ? Till 2011

Posted on June 19, 2008
Last April, Microsoft met with criticism when it announced that it would deactivate all music purchased from MSN Music. Customers rightly protested that the decision to pull the plug on the Digital Rights Management (DRM) servers that allow MSN Music customers to ?reauthorize? music files would render their purchases useless At the time, EFF announced an open letter to Microsoft, urging them to make things right with their customers by giving refunds or replacing DRM-crippled music, and by avoiding use of DRM in the future...

URGENT: Tell Congress to Vote Against Immunity

Posted on June 19, 2008
In February, the House stood up for civil liberties and voted against a bill that contained immunity. But now the political landscape has changed, and all signs suggest that the House may be prepared to cave to the White House and vote to pass this bill...

EFF Urges Congress to Reject Final 'Compromise' on Telco Immunity

Posted on June 19, 2008
Washington, D.C. - EFF calls on members of the House of Representatives to vote "NO" on H.R.6304, the FISA Amendments Act of 2008, which the House is expected to vote on tomorrow. The text of the bill was released today, and it contains blanket retroactive immunity for telcos that broke the law by cooperating with the NSA's warrantless surveillance program...

EFF Obtains New FISA Bill Containing Telecom Immunity, Vote in House Tomorrow!

Posted on June 19, 2008
EFF has obtained a copy of the new FISA "compromise", and -- surprise! -- it contains blanket immunity for telecoms that helped the NSA break the law and spy on millions of ordinary Americans, just as we predicted yesterday. House Leadership intends to bring this bill to the floor for a vote tomorrow, so please contact your Congressperson now and tell them to vote NO on H...

Immunity in the News

Posted on June 18, 2008
As Congress gets ready to vote on a new version of the FISA bill -- addressing the crucial question of whether it should pass immunity for telecom lawbreakers that participated in the NSA's illegal spying program -- the New York Times Editorial Board has weighed in...

New Ninth Circuit Case Protects Text Message Privacy From Police and Employers

Posted on June 18, 2008
Today?s Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals opinion in Quon v. Arch Wireless is a victory for the privacy of email and text messages. The holding means that law enforcement needs a probable cause warrant to access stored copies of your electronic messages less than 180 days old, regardless of whether you have already downloaded or read them...

EFF Speaks Out Against Telecom Immunity Deal

Posted on June 18, 2008
Washington, D.C. - Congress is widely reported to have struck a deal on legislation to amend the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) that includes immunity for telecommunications companies that helped the government illegally spy on millions of ordinary Americans...

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