News & Commentary

The federal Real ID Act doesn't have many friends these days. Eighteen states have passed legislation rejecting the law, Congress has refused to put any money into implementing it, and just this week New York Gov. Elliot Spitzer announced he, not the Feds, would determine New York's drivers license policy, with officials in his administration indicating the state might opt out of the Real ID program altogether.

The few remaining cheerleaders for this national ID system, which promises to be a nightmare for privacy and identity security, have resorted to classic doublespeak to try to salvage Real ID's reputation. On the Department of Homeland Security blog Wednesday, Secretary Michael Chertoff claims Real ID would actually pr

While some corporations see fair use as a thorn in the side, suing on everything from reverse engineering of software (Sony v. Connectix) to linking thumbnail images in internet searches (Perfect 10 v. Amazon.com), and stress the economic importance of strong copyright protection , it makes sense that fair use pumps significant funds into the economy.

Without fair use, our knowledge based economy simply could not function as it does. For example, fair use permits search engines, like Google, to provide a vast array of information without infringing. So absent fair use, the search engines we use each day to access information would not be able to run.

If fair use didn't exist, it would be illegal to replay a copyrighted television show on a VCR or through services like TIVO (Sony v. Universal City Studios) and newspapers and magazines could not include quotes from books in their reviews.

Indeed, it would be hard to imagine a world without fair use. Fair use enables major recording artists, li

Earlier, Verizon told NARAL it does not accept programs from any group "that seeks to promote an agenda or distribute content that, in its discretion, may be seen as controversial or unsavory to any of our users." Never mind that you have t

Figures released last week by the London Assembly of Liberal Democrats suggest that London's video surveillance network, totaling over 10,500 cameras in all, does not help solve crimes.

Various companies report being able to purchase anonymized, but user-specific internet activity logs from big ISPs. Comcast has been accused of selling its voice over IP customers' account information as soon as the phones leave their box. When t

The American Civil Liberties Union today announced the launch of a new "Surveillance Society Clock" to symbolize the reality that we are fast approaching a genuine surveillance society in the United States. The clock is set at six minutes before the "midnight" of such a dark end to privacy. Also being released is a new report summarizing the state of privacy today, and video of "Monster Among Us," a new piece written and performed by spoken-word artists Steve Connell & Sekou (tha misfit).

In August, privacy advocates applauded the Defense Department's decision to close its Threat and Local Observation Notice (TALON) system. While the decision to shut down the much maligned program is a good one, it certainly does not mean the end to the intelligence database threat to civil liberties.

A federal court today struck down the amended Patriot Act's National Security Letter (NSL) provision. The law has permitted the FBI to issue NSLs demanding private information about people within the United States without court approval, and to gag those who receive NSLs from discussing them. The court found that the gag power was unconstitutional and that because the statute prevented courts from engaging in meaningful judicial review of gags, it violated the First Amendment and the principle of separation of powers.

Earlier this week, the Federal Election Commission (FEC) ruled in support of freedom of speech for bloggers. The FEC dismissed complaints against the DailyKos and a blog site critical of former Representative Mary Bono.