Earlier today, the Australian Senate passed a sweeping new ‘anti-terror’ law that will allow the Australian government to conduct mass surveillance on all of its citizens, will make whistleblowing on intelligence issues a crime, and threatens to criminalize basic reporting. The bill is an enormous threat to press freedom, free …
Last week longtime local publisher Howard Owens, founder of the online news site the Batavian, launched a new publication covering Wyoming County in upstate New York. Buried in a parenthetical within his welcome message to readers was a fascinating promise: “We’ll also respect your privacy by not gathering personal data …
Good news for whistleblowers, journalists, and everyone who likes to browse the Internet with an added cloak of privacy: the Tor network got a little stronger. Tor—software that lets you mask your IP address—relies on an international network of committed volunteers to run relays to help mask traffic. And that …
This post is adapted from CJ Ciaramella's weekly Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) newsletter, which you can subscribe to here. The most transparent administration in history, an ongoing series At a three-day convention of the American Society of News Editors, the Associated Press Media Editors and the Associated …
More than fifteen months after the NSA revelations laid bare the overwhelming scope of online surveillance and fueled the demand for privacy, virtually none of the top news websites—including all those who have reported on the Snowden documents—have adopted the most basic of security measures to protect the integrity of …
This post is adapted from CJ Ciaramella's weekly Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) newsletter, which you can subscribe to here. Footnote of the Year from the Supreme Court of Texas: Page five, footnote seven of this decision ...
Two weeks ago, the DOJ Inspector General released a report on the FBI’s use of National Security Letters (NSLs)—the controversial (and unconstitutional) surveillance instruments used to gather personal information of Americans without any prior oversight from a judge. In a little-noticed passage buried in the report, the IG describes …
This post is adapted from CJ Ciaramella's weekly Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) newsletter, which you can subscribe to here. SWAT Secrecy and Pentagon Hand-me-downs This week the ACLU issued a report on police militarization based on hundreds of public records requests to police departments across the country. …
This post is adapted from CJ Ciaramella's weekly Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) newsletter, which you can subscribe to here.FOIAs of the week: There's a quote about geography—via my old friend and GIS ninja Lyzi Diamond—that's stuck with me for a long time and might as …
There are roughly 35,000 pages of unreleased FBI documents on one of the true unsung heroes of the civil liberties movement in the United States, and we need your help to make them public. You may have heard part of this extraordinary story when it was first revealed earlier …
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