April Glaser
Electronic Frontier Foundation
Watch for it. This year student protest and resistance to mass surveillance might be bursting at the seams. The Internet, which students across the world have grown up with, is under threat. And now more than ever, student leaders are contacting EFF, wanting to know how to get involved to protect our rights online.
Now is the time to organize. We’re calling on all concerned students, whether new organizers or seasoned campus leaders, to join the growing movement to fight for our right communicate and innovate, unhampered by oppressive government surveillance and creativity-stifling copyright law.
Surveillance chills speech. When we know that researching politically controversial topics might make us targets for increased government scrutiny, we are less likely to research. Digital privacy is an intellectual freedom issue. And that’s why we’re thrilled to bring this movement to college campuses.
Katitza Rodriguez
Electronic Frontier Foundation
The Canadian government's surveillance of innocent Canadians is secretive, expensive, and out-of-control—that’s the message of a new video launched this morning by Canadian digital rights organization, OpenMedia.ca. The group is leading a large, non-partisan, Canadian coalition of organizations calling for effective legal measures to safeguard Canadians from government spying.
The video reveals how information collected by government spy agency, CSEC (Communications Security Establishment Canada), can expose intimate details about Canadians’ private lives, including their financial status, medical conditions, political and religious beliefs, and even sexual orientation. CSEC was caught as they spied on thousands of innocent Canadian air travelers earlier this year.
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| Pine Gap, Australia |
Jon Rappoport
Remember the name “Pine Gap.” It lies at the heart of this story.
I’ve always thought Australians were more blunt and forthright than Americans. I don’t know if that’s true, but the current debate about total surveillance in the Land Down Under is cutting to the bone.
The government wants to tax the Australian people so it can use giant telecoms to collect wall to wall “metadata” on them. (Pay us so we can spy on you.)
The Age newspaper reports on an Australian senate inquiry into the plan:
In a referendum that could ultimately have national implications, Missouri voters will go to the polls Aug. 5 with the opportunity to add protection for electronic data and communications to their state constitution.
Amendment 9 would give “electronic data and communications” the same state constitutional protections as “persons, homes, papers and effects.” This would eliminate any constitutional ambiguity surrounding electronic data and specifically bar state agencies from accessing it without a warrant in most cases.
By prohibiting state agents from “accessing” warrantless electronic data, it would make such data gathered by federal agencies such as the NSA and shared with state and local law enforcement inadmissible in state criminal proceedings.
