EFFector 36.9
Decoding the Courts’ Digital Decisions
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In our 811th issue:
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Protect Online Privacy and Free Speech. Become an EFF member today!
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Top Features
The U.S. Supreme Court correctly found that social media platforms, like newspapers, bookstores, and art galleries before them, have First Amendment rights to curate and edit the speech of others they deliver to their users, and the government has a very limited role in dictating what social media platforms must and must not publish.
Whatever the good intentions of lawmakers, laws that censor the internet directly harm people’s ability to speak online, access others’ speech, remain anonymous, and preserve their privacy. Recent decisions by the Supreme Court and two federal district courts underscore how these laws, in addition to being unconstitutional, are also bad policy.
EFF Updates
Director, writer, and actor Alex Winter — a leading documentarian of the evolution of internet communities — joins EFF’s Cindy Cohn and Jason Kelley to discuss the harms of behavioral advertising, what algorithms can and can’t be blamed for, and promoting the kind of digital literacy that can bring about a better internet for all of us.
The federal ban on TikTok must be put under the finest judicial microscope to determine its constitutionality, EFF and others argued in a friend-of-the-court brief filed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.
Look up! We’ll probably see many more drones overhead as more police departments seek to implement a popular project justifying the deployment of unmanned aerial vehicles: the “drone as first responder.”
For the past year, EFF has been sounding the alarm about police in California illegally sharing drivers' location data with anti-abortion states, putting abortion seekers and providers at risk of prosecution. So we applaud the Sacramento County Grand Jury for hearing this call and investigating two police agencies that had been unlawfully sharing this data out-of-state.
The end of June concluded LGBTQ+ Pride month, yet the risks LGBTQ+ people face persist every month of the year. We know it feels overwhelming to think about how to keep yourself safe, so here are some quick and easy steps you can take to protect yourself at in-person events, as well as to protect your data—everything from your private messages with friends to your pictures and browsing history.
Here’s an audio version of EFFector. We hope you enjoy it!
Announcements
EFF is honored to announce that Tarah Wheeler — a social scientist studying international conflict, an author, and a poker player who is CEO of the cybersecurity compliance company Red Queen Dynamics — has joined EFF’s Board of Directors.
EFF is excited to kick off a new series of livestream events this summer! Please join EFF staff and fellow digital freedom supporters as we dive into three topics near and dear to our hearts: The U.S. Supreme Court Takes on the Internet (July 18), Reproductive Justice in the Digital Age (Aug. 28), and How to Protest with Privacy in Mind (Oct. 17). RSVP now!
Craig Newmark Philanthropies will match up to $30,000 for your entire first year as a new monthly or annual EFF Sustaining Donor! Many thanks to Craig Newmark — founder of craigslist and a persistent supporter of digital freedom — for making this possible.
Job Openings
EFF seeks a full-time Director of Major Gifts to develop and implement donor engagement and fundraising strategies while also stewarding and cultivating top-level major donor relationships. You will be responsible for setting and implementing EFF’s strategy for major and mid-level donors, as well as planned gifts; your portfolio will include relationships with about 100 current major donors and estates, who you will steward through our giving societies and individual engagement plans. Working closely with your Membership colleagues, you will craft fundraising materials for major donors’
annual giving and engage donors through a slate of online and in-person events. While we expect you to learn enough about our work to converse with our donor community, you will work closely with our lawyers, activists, technologists, and executives to provide deeper connections for our highly engaged donors. As a seasoned major gifts fundraiser, you will have a vision for what is possible building on our giving societies and individualized strategies for cultivation and stewardship; this includes strategies for acquisition, upgrade, and asks for exceptional gifts.
MiniLinks
“The surgeon general is leaning into sort of fearmongering and concern without a scientific basis to label speech platforms that we all use to share, express ourselves, and that teens all use and likening them to dangerous products like cigarettes or vehicles,” EFF’s Aaron Mackey told NPR's Mary Louise Kelly.
“It hasn’t really been very long since Dobbs and since states have actually started implementing extremely abortion restrictive laws, so we’re still in sort of the nascent stages of abortion prosecutions,” EFF’s Lisa Femia said.
“Telegram is not just a messaging app, it is also a social media platform. As a social media platform, it is sitting on an enormous amount of user data,” EFF’s Eva Galperin said. “‘Thirty engineers’ means that there is no one to fight legal requests, there is no infrastructure for dealing with abuse and content moderation issues.”
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Supported by Donors
Our members make it possible for EFF to bring legal and technological expertise into crucial battles about online rights. Whether defending free speech online or challenging unconstitutional surveillance, your participation makes a difference. Every donation gives technology users who value freedom online a stronger voice and more formidable advocate. Check out our FAQ for information on memberships, donations, shop orders, corporate giving, matching gifts, and other ways to give. https://www.eff.org/pages/membership-faq
If you aren't already, please consider becoming an EFF member today.
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