Our work
EDRi is the biggest European network defending rights and freedoms online. We work to to challenge private and state actors who abuse their power to control or manipulate the public. We do so by advocating for robust and enforced laws, informing and mobilising people, promoting a healthy and accountable technology market, and building a movement of organisations and individuals committed to digital rights and freedoms in a connected world.
Filter resources
-
Human rights groups win European Court of Human Rights claim on UK mass surveillance regime
Eight year legal battle against UK mass surveillance programmes exposed by whistleblower Edward Snowden culminates in victory for privacy. EDRi's member Privacy International worked actively to make this happen.
Read more
-
Copyright Reform in Germany: Damage Reduction on Article 17
While waiting for the implementation guidelines from the European Commission and the CJEU ruling on whether upload filters are legal or not, some Member States are implementing the Directive. Germany has done some damage reduction in its implementation, according to former MEP and current GFF staff Felix Reda
Read more
-
From ‘trustworthy AI’ to curtailing harmful uses: EDRi’s impact on the proposed EU AI Act
Civil society has been the underdog in the European Union's (EU) negotiations on the artificial intelligence (AI) regulation. The goal of the regulation has been to create the conditions for AI to be developed and deployed across Europe, so any shift towards prioritising people’s safety, dignity and rights feels like a great achievement. Whilst a lot needs to happen to make this shift a reality in the final text, EDRi takes stock of it’s impact on the proposed Artificial Intelligence Act (AIA). EDRi and partners mobilised beyond organisations traditionally following digital initiatives managing to establish that some uses of AI are simply unacceptable.
Read more
-
Antiterrorists in a bike shed – policy and politics of the Terrorist Content Regulation
The short story: an ill-fated law with dubious evidence base, targeting an important modern problem with poorly chosen measures, goes through an exhausting legislative process to be adopted without proper democratic scrutiny due to a procedural peculiarity. How did we manage to end up in this mess? And what does it tell us about the power of agenda setting the name of the “do something” doctrine?
Read more
-
EDRi-gram, 19 May 2021
The increasing use of facial recognition and other biometric surveillance technologies – on our streets, in train stations, at protests, at sports matches and even in our global ‘town square’, Facebook – means that our freedom to be anonymous in public spaces, our freedom to just be, really does face an existential threat. The mask is a symbol of resistance against the growing use of mass facial recognition. Get this symbolic merch and support the work EDRi does.
Read more
-
Spotify, don’t spy: global coalition of 180+ musicians and human rights groups take a stand against speech-recognition technology
“You can’t rock out when you’re under constant corporate surveillance. Spotify needs to drop this right now and do right by musicians, music fans, and all music workers.” - Tom Morello
Read more
-
DSA Proposal: Recommendations for the EU Parliament and Council
The Digital Services Act (DSA) is a mixed bag with some promising proposals, shares EDRi's member Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF). In their "Recommendations for the EU Parliament and Council", they take a closer look at the substance of the DSA proposal and propose concrete suggestions for improvements.
Read more
-
“E-evidence” negotiations: a call to protect media freedoms and democratic rights from abusive cross-border orders
Together with a coalition of 25 organisations and companies, European Digital Rights (EDRi) urges the European Parliament and the Council to uphold a high level of procedural safeguards in their negotiations on the so-called “e-evidence Regulation”.
Read more
-
Can a COVID-19 face mask protect you from facial recognition technology too?
Mass facial recognition risks our collective futures and shapes us into fear-driven societies of suspicion. This got folks at EDRi and Privacy International brainstorming. Could the masks that we now wear to protect each other from Coronavirus also protect our anonymity, preventing the latest mass facial recognition systems from identifying us?
Read more
-
Washed in blue: living lab Digital Perimeter in Amsterdam
An increasing amount of Dutch government agencies seem to resort to so-called ‘living labs’ and ‘field labs’ in order to test and experiment with technological innovations in a realistic setting. In recent years, these live laboratories have proven to be a useful stepping stone to introduce new technologies into public space. In the last several weeks, EDRi's member Bits of Freedom took a closer look at one of those living labs – the so-called Digital Perimeter surrounding the Johan Cruijff ArenA in Amsterdam – and were not pleased with what they saw.
Read more
-
FLoC: Google’s new means of following you across the web
If you browse the web without an ad blocker, you will have noticed that the ads you see tend to follow you around. Have you been looking around for a new pair of shoes? Be prepared to see more ads for shoes on completely unrelated websites. This advertising technique is called "behavioural retargeting" and is built on recording your web history in a central place, then using that information to select ads that advertisers expect you are more likely to react to. In this article. EDRi's member epicenter.works sheds some light on Google's new way of tracking users across the web.
Read more
-
New Cybercrime Protocol: weak safeguards against big risks of abuse
In 2017, the Council of Europe (CoE) and its Cybercrime Committee started preparing an additional protocol to the Budapest Convention on Cybercrime – a new tool for law enforcement authorities (LEAs) to have access to data held by private companies in the context of criminal investigations.
Read more