The claim that ICE is serving the interest of privacy is not unreasonable from a legal standpoint, Jeramie Scott, senior counsel for the Electronic Privacy Information Center, said. […] “They can claim exemptions and that sort of holding – that’s not unreasonable per se,” Scott said. “But that doesn’t mean it definitely applies in this … Continued
There are also concerns about how “voluntary participation” is defined when travelers may face significant delays or secondary screening if they object to being scanned. Reports by the Government Accountability Office and the Electronic Privacy Information Center have documented the risks of the technology’s deployment, particularly when agencies like CBP act without firm legal boundaries … Continued
EPIC, Color Of Change, and Consumer Federation of America are today releasing a new report on how the tech industry undermines the push for privacy legislation. As states like Massachusetts move towards important privacy legislation, a common complaint from tech industry lobbyists is their fear of a “patchwork” of differing state standards to which their … Continued
“The Court of Appeals reached the right decision here,” said Jeramie D. Scott, senior counsel and director for the D.C.-based Electronic Privacy Information Center’s Project on Surveillance Oversight, in a statement. “Hopefully in the future, Oregon State Police will seek a warrant first to conduct this type of aerial surveillance, so a neutral arbiter can … Continued
So we spoke to John Davisson about this. He’s the director of litigation at the nonprofit Electronic Privacy Information Center. I mean, and he says, you know, to have something this monumental of a change, you really need to have a public conversation about it. There needs to be opportunity for the public to weigh … Continued
Yesterday, EPIC, Common Sense Media, Cybersecurity for Democracy, the Tech Justice Law Project, and eleven legal scholars of digital rights, platform governance, and Section 230 filed an amicus brief in the Ninth Circuit explaining why Section 230 does not block claims that Meta designed its platforms to be addictive for kids. The appeal stems from … Continued
Early this morning, the Senate, on a 99-1 vote, approved an amendment sponsored by Senators Blackburn, Cantwell, and Collins striking the provision that would have prevented states from regulating artificial intelligence systems for 10 years. Yesterday, it had been reported that Senator Marsha Blackburn and Ted Cruz had reached a proposed compromise on the AI … Continued
Earlier today, Senators Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) and Ted Cruz (R-TX) announced a proposed compromise on the proposed moratorium on state AI laws contained in the Senate’s reconciliation bill. Senator Blackburn had previously expressed concern over the moratorium and the effect it would have on laws such as Tennessee’s ELVIS Act, which protects artists’ voices from … Continued
The justices erred by failing to consider other less invasive means of age-gating porn, said Tom McBrien, counsel at the Electronic Privacy Information Center. Examples include methods “that do not create a record of which users visited which websites,” McBrien said. Read more here.
The now-gutted CFPB lacks both the resources and authority needed to police the widespread exploitation of consumers’ personal information, says the Electronic Privacy Information Center, the privacy rights advocacy agency. Read more here.
Legal experts told NPR they were alarmed that a development of this magnitude was already underway without a transparent and public process. “That is a debate that needs to play out in a public setting,” said John Davisson, the director of litigation at the nonprofit Electronic Privacy Information Center. “It’s one that deserves public scrutiny … Continued
Today, the Supreme Court issued a decision in Free Speech Coalition v. Paxton, giving legislatures wide latitude to impose age verification requirements on users wishing to access pornography online. EPIC had submitted an amicus brief in the case urging the Court to take a narrow and nuanced approach that would allow legislatures to force companies … Continued
But consumer advocates, like Suzanne Bernstein with the privacy protection advocacy group the Electronic Privacy Information Center, worry that breaches like those experienced by McLaren risk “chilling access to health care” as hacking attacks become more frequent. “We’re often seeing reporting of the breach of really sensitive health information from hospital systems,” said Bernstein. “There’s … Continued
EPIC joined Consumer Action and over 35 other organizations to call on the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) to maintain public access to the CFPB’s complaint portal system. EPIC signed on to Consumer Action’s letter urging the CFPB to maintain the complaint system and ensure that consumer complaints receive timely responses. The CFPB maintains a complaint … Continued
In January 2025, the Electronic Privacy Information Center, along with the Irish Council for Civil Liberties, submitted a complaint and request for investigation to the FTC. The complaint alleges that for a decade, Google, which makes Nest smart-home devices, knowingly sent sensitive user data via real-time bidding to “foreign adversary” countries in violation of federal … Continued
Today, the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) released Assessing the Assessments: Maximizing the Effectiveness of Algorithmic & Privacy Risk Assessments.
In Tech Policy Press article debunking state AI law myths, Kara Williams, a law fellow at the Electronic Privacy Information Center, and Ben Winters, director of AI and privacy at the Consumer Federation of America, point out that big tech companies have repeatedly failed to honor their own promises to self-regulate. Williams and Winters argue … Continued
To avoid similar lawsuits from tech companies, civil rights organizations gathered under the Kids Code Coalition have been working on overhauling the Code. The Nebraska and Vermont bills are significantly different from those enacted in California and Maryland, according to the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), one of the organizations supporting Vermont’s efforts to re-write … Continued
Kansas Department for Children and Families officials received a letter from the U.S. Department of Agriculture in early May demanding personal information about SNAP recipients in the state. DCF refused to send the data, stating, “At this time, we are unsure as to the reason for the USDA’s request.” A motion for a temporary restraining … Continued
This time, Mattel says it will prioritize “innovation, privacy and safety” in its partnership with OpenAI. To create a child-appropriate A.I. product, OpenAI would likely need to develop a closed system with tightly curated training data and built-in safeguards limiting the types of queries the models can answer, according to Calli Schroeder, director of the … Continued
If placing additional information in the honest and careful hands of state election officials is a boon, many interviewed for this article expressed concern over the ease with which such a gift could be perverted. Kabbas Azhar, an Equal Justice Works fellow with the nonprofit Electronic Privacy Information Center, said the Trump administration’s willingness to … Continued
The nonprofit Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) has expressed support for California’s Age-Appropriate Design Code (CAADC). The law has faced two preliminary injunctions over questions about First Amendment violations. But MLex reports on EPIC’s comment to a U.S. appeals court that affirming those rulings – which argue the law’s definition of coverage make it entirely … Continued
“What this individual allegedly did is what abusive individuals have done for decades,” said Justin Sherman, a data broker expert and scholar in residence at Electronic Privacy Information Center. “They want to find out where someone lives, whether that’s someone they’re currently seeing or an ex-wife who moved to a new state. … They will … Continued
Yesterday, EPIC submitted an amicus brief in NetChoice v. Bonta, a case in which tech industry trade group NetChoice is attempting to overturn a kids privacy law, the California Age-Appropriate Design Code (“CAADC”), on First Amendment grounds. EPIC’s brief urges the Ninth Circuit to reverse the district court’s dangerous ruling that the CAADC’s regulation of … Continued
EPIC and Consumer Reports submitted comments to the California Privacy Protection Agency responding to the Agency’s Notice of Proposed Rulemaking on its Delete Request and Opt-out Platform (DROP) System Requirements, recommending additional steps to make the requirements most effective. The Agency is creating the DROP, a publicly accessible universal deletion mechanism for consumers to request … Continued
The Electronic Privacy Information Center told a US appeals court that affirming a ruling that the California Age-Appropriate Design Code coverage definition renders the whole law content-based would threaten the entire regime of data protection law. “Many foundational and noncontroversial data protection laws, most notably the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, contain similar types of … Continued
EPIC and Public Knowledge filed joint comments on June 6 encouraging the Federal Communications Commission to ensure that carriers protect the location information of individuals contacting 911, as new technologies are deployed to discern caller location more precisely. While both consumer advocacy organizations support equipping emergency personnel with adequately precise caller location information where time … Continued
Launching targeted advertising only adds to these concerns. “This is another betrayal of the privacy protections that once distinguished WhatsApp and attracted many of its users to the platform,” John Davisson, the director of litigation at the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), says in a statement to The Verge. “Meta has taken a service that … Continued
“Many data brokers, and in particular people search websites, have enabled horrific violence for decades by aggregating and selling data on people and their families, searchable by name, for dollars or cents,” Justin Sherman, a scholar in residence at the Electronic Privacy Information Center, said. Read more here.
“There is clear potential for data protection risks, particularly when it comes to personally identifiable or sensitive data”, said Calli Schroeder, senior counsel at the Electronic Privacy Information Center in Washington DC. “Even when companies include warnings, if the user experience is confusing or if defaults lean toward exposure, that presents a compliance risk”. Read … Continued
The complaint was spearheaded by the Consumer Federation of America (CFA), with other signatories including Public Citizen, Common Sense, the Electronic Privacy Information Center, and 16 other organizations. “Character.AI and Meta AI Studio are endangering the public by facilitating the impersonation of licensed and actual mental health providers,” they write. “We urge your offices to … Continued
EPIC filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit on June 4 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia challenging the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency’s inadequate responses to a FOIA request submitted by EPIC in March 2024 and appealed within the agency in December 2024. In April 2025, Senator Ron Wyden … Continued
Yesterday, the New York Senate passed the New York AI Act, a bill aimed at preventing algorithmic discrimination. The bill, sponsored by Sen. Kristen Gonzalez, regulates the development and use of automated decisionmaking systems used in making consequential decisions about New Yorkers, such as decisions about employment, education, housing, or health care. “EPIC commends Sen. … Continued
“We’ve seen a lot of examples of people sending very, very personal information to AI therapist chatbots or saying very intimate things to chatbots in other settings,” said Calli Schroeder, a senior counsel at the Electronic Privacy Information Center. “I think many people assume there’s some baseline level of confidentiality there. There’s not. Everything you … Continued
This afternoon, Governor Phil Scott signed the Vermont Age-Appropriate Design Code (AADC) into law. The Vermont AADC protects kids’ privacy, enhances kids’ autonomy, and ensures their online safety by prohibiting abusive data and design practices. The law will take effect Jan. 1, 2027.
Calli Schroeder, senior counsel for the Electronic Privacy Information Center, said in an interview with WIRED that she has seen people “sharing medical information, mental health information, home addresses, even things directly related to pending court cases.” “All of that’s incredibly concerning, both because I think it points to how people are misunderstanding what these … Continued
Sara Geoghegan, senior counsel at the Electronic Privacy Information Center, said that 23andMe’s privacy policy was subject to change and not adequate to protect customers’ data. In an interview in March, she stressed the sensitivity of genetic data. “I would be very concerned if I had given a swab to 23andMe,” she said. “There is … Continued
Sara Geoghegan, EPIC and Ben Winters, CFA (This blog is cross-posted on both sites) In an era of maximization of data collection, consumers are left to rely on walls of pop-ups and click-throughs as well as broad promises about companies “caring about privacy.” When you track your steps, google your symptoms, or check the price … Continued
This bill would require companies that develop and use automated decision systems to test them, inform people if an ADS will be used to make an important decision about them, and provide an explanation of the decision after it is made.
Yesterday, Oregon Governor Tina Kotek signed H.B. 2008, a bill that amends the Oregon Data Privacy Law to ban the sale of precise geolocation data and the data of minors under 16.
It’s been seven years since the GDPR came into force, enshrining privacy rights for EU residents and changing the global privacy landscape. Throughout its history, the GDPR has been both lauded and criticized. It has inspired privacy regulations throughout the world and changed the way international companies do business, sometimes to their chagrin. With a … Continued
EPIC filed comments in support of the FTC’s recent proposed consent agreement with Workado, a company that made false claims about the accuracy and efficacy of its AI services. The company claimed that its service could determine whether content was human or AI-generated with 98% accuracy. However, the service was only 53% accurate. Companies should … Continued
EPIC submitted comments to the California Privacy Protection Agency (CPPA) urging the Agency to restore earlier drafts of the regulations that were more privacy protective rather than adopting the current draft, which has been significantly weakened.
A presentation at Internet Identity Workshop (IIW) 40 by Steve McCown, Utah Privacy Officer Chris Bramwell and Digital Trust Ventures Co-founder and Principal Timothy Ruff on the privacy concerns with mDLs that are not alleviated by the ISO/IEC 18013-5 standard inspired Decentralized Identity Foundation (DIF) ED Kim Hamilton Duffy to delve into the concern. It … Continued
Under his direction, DOGE staffers carried out a slash-and-burn policy across the federal government, including the Education and Defense departments, CISA and the U.S. Census Bureau. Musk’s team also accessed vast amounts of sensitive information on millions of Americans through federal agency databases. “Having personal information about someone confers the government a certain amount of … Continued
The campaign, titled No Phone Home, is backed by a statement that calls for identity systems like mobile driver’s licenses to adopt a technological standard that is incapable of tracking or surveilling users. “Identity systems that phone home facilitate centralized tracking and control, privacy invasions, and other potential abuses,” the statement warns. “If this capability … Continued
In an amicus brief in State vs. Miles, the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL) back Miles’ request, arguing that sharing these details is necessary to ensure courts are making decisions based on good evidence. EPIC and other organizations involved in the … Continued
Today, the Vermont Legislature passed the Vermont Age-Appropriate Design Code (AADC). The Vermont AADC protects kids’ privacy, enhances kids’ autonomy, and ensures their online safety by prohibiting abusive data and design practices. The bill now awaits the Governor’s approval.
EPIC filed an amicus brief in State v. Miles calling on the court to recognize a defendant’s right to know the details of how he was identified using facial recognition technology