A federal appeals court ruled in a landmark decision on Thursday that the bulk telephone surveillance program operated by the U.S. National Security Agency and revealed in 2013 by whistleblower Edward Snowden is illegal. The Second Circuit Court of Appeals in New York said the surveillance program, which swept up billions of phone records and…
A federal judge ruled in favor of the National Security Agency in a key surveillance case on Tuesday, dismissing a challenge which claimed the government’s spying operations were groundless and unconstitutional. Filed in 2008 by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the lawsuit, Jewel v. NSA, aimed to end the agency’s warrantless surveillance of U.S. citizens, which…
As the U.S. Senate readies for a vote on legislation designed to constrain some of the troubling aspects of domestic surveillance and the national security state, both advocacy groups and private industry are weighing in on the measure. A coalition of big-name technology and Internet companies — including Facebook, Apple, Twitter, and Dropbox — is…
Mass electronic surveillance by intelligence agencies violates “the very essence of the right to privacy” and threatens international law, according to the official report released Wednesday by the United Nations counter-terrorism investigator. “The hard truth is that the use of mass surveillance technology effectively does away with the right to privacy of communications on the…
FBI Director James Comey has responded to recent moves by tech giants Apple and Google to offer better encryption services on their handheld devices by suggesting that giving people the ability to protect their private communications from state law enforcement agencies is akin to lawlessness. In recent weeks both companies have rolled out new software…
Lawyers for the ACLU on Tuesday presented arguments before a federal court as they challenged the U.S. government’s claimed authority to bulk collect and search America’s cell phone data, which the group argues is unconstitutional and exceeds Congressional authority provided by the Patriot Act. “The government cannot demonstrate, as the statute requires it to, that…
