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Belgian Big Brother Awards 2015 go to surveillance measures in schools and privacy-invasive apps
On 15 October, the Big Brother Awards 2015 took place in Brussels. The Awards are presented annually to “reward” the leading privacy violators.
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Unclear “net neutrality” proposal returns to European Parliament – civil society groups call for action
Following the conclusion of an unclear compromise on net neutrality and mobile phone roaming charges earlier this year, the Telecoms Single Market Regulation proposal has finally been submitted to the European Parliament for final approval.
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Fifteen years late, Safe Harbor hits the rocks
Today, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) confirmed what the European Commission has been denying for the past fifteen years – the “Safe Harbor” agreement on transferring data to the United States is invalid. “Safe Harbor was flawed in principle and flawed in practice” said Joe McNamee, Executive Director of European Digital […]
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Finland: New surveillance law threatens fundamental rights
Finnish EDRi member Electronic Frontier Finland (Effi) is gravely concerned over a draft law on Internet surveillance. The bill that the country’s current government is in the process of preparing will grant the military and the Finnish Security Intelligence Service (Supo) the authority to conduct electronic mass surveillance for military and civilian intelligence purposes. On […]
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CCC campaigns to provide Internet access to refugees in Germany
German EDRi member Chaos Computer Club (CCC), along with free network associations Freifunk Berlin and the Förderverein freie Netzwerke, is running a fundraising campaign in support of the non-profit organisation Refugees Emancipation (RE). The project, initiated by asylum-seekers, aims to prevent the isolation and enhance the connectivity of refugees in Germany by enabling their access […]
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EU Commission: IT companies to fix “terrorist use of the Internet”
In August 2015, the European Commission confirmed to EDRi that it’s preparing to partner with US online companies to set up an “EU Internet Forum” which apparently includes discussing the monitoring and censorship of communications in Europe. Participants of this Forum include Facebook, Google/YouTube, Ask.fm, Microsoft and Twitter. The first meeting was held on 24 […]
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EU Commission: IT companies to fix “hate speech on the Internet”
At the Colloquium on Fundamental Rights on 2 October 2015, EU Commissioner for Justice, Consumers and Gender Equality Věra Jourová gave a widely-reported speech on “hate speech”. At the meeting, she announced that she was organising a meeting between “IT companies, business, national authorities and civil society” in order to “tackle” online hate speech. With […]
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Netherlands: New proposals for dragnet surveillance underway
In the Netherlands, online consultations by the government have been concluded on far-reaching proposals that foresee the expansion of surveillance powers of the intelligence services and the creation of new surveillance powers for the tax authorities (“Wet op de inlichtingen- en veiligheidsdiensten” and “Concept-Besluit Bijzondere vergaring nummergegevens telecommunicatie”). If proposed and enacted into law, they […]
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Civil rights groups condemn draft mass surveillance bill to be adopted in France
Today EDRi, together with 30 civil rights groups, sent the following letter to French parliamentarians to condemn a draft mass surveillance bill which is scheduled to be adopted on 1 October. You can download the letter in English (pdf) and in French (pdf). If your organisation wishes to sign, please contact us at brussels(at)edri.org. Dear […]
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Civil society calls for reform of trialogues in a letter to EU Commission, Parliament and Council
European Digital Rights (EDRi), together with 17 signatory organisations, today sent an open letter to European Parliament President Martin Schulz, Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker and Council Secretary-General Jeppe Tranholm-Mikkelsen, calling for a major reform of the so-called “trialogues”. “Trialogues cannot be a means for EU institutions to circumvent their obligations with regard to transparency and […]
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Safe Harbor: European Court Advocate General says Agreement should be declared invalid
This morning, the Advocate General of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), in his Opinion on the “Safe Harbor” Agreement with the United States, advised the Court to declare the entire Agreement invalid. The catalyst for the case was the mass surveillance practices of the United States. Sixteen years ago, the EU […]
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Generali, the health insurer who wants to know everything about you
On 20 May 2015, we published a collection of science fiction stories for the 300th edition of EDRi-gram newsletter – the premise of the collection was scenarios that we envisaged happening in 2025. We did not imagine that one of the stories on data collection practices by health insurers would be getting closer to reality […]
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