whistleblower
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Threat to the protection of personal data in Belgium: European civil society is concerned
EDRi, alongisde multiple civil society organisations, is the signatory of an open letter addressed to the Belgian Parliament, demanding better enforcement of the European data protection rules and guarantees of political independence of the Belgian Data Protection Authority.
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Platform Regulation: Key takeways from Haugen’s hearing
On 8 November 2021, Frances Haugen, the Facebook whistleblower, participated in a hearing of the European Parliament’s Internal Market and Consumer Protection Committee (IMCO). While her testimony brought extremely important insights into Facebook’s opaque operations, it also showed that Haugen’s thinking of what the digital world in Europe should look like is influenced by her expertise in data science rather than public policy, as well as by her professional experience working with Silicon Valley’s centralised mega-platforms.
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Call for whistleblowing is not a crime: The case of a peace activist
The peace activist Hermann Theisen has been convicted by several lower courts for calling on employees of weapons manufacturers to expose illegal activities of their employers. EDRi observer Gesellschaft für Freiheitsrechte (GFF, Society for Civil Rights) supports him in his appeal procedures to get German courts to recognise that neither whistleblowing in the public interest […]
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The European Parliament calls for protection of whistleblowers
On 24 October, the European Parliament adopted a resolution calling on the European Commission to propose legislation protecting whistleblowers in the European Union (EU). The institution made a clear statement recognising the essential role that whistleblowers play in our society, as well as the need to protect them. Whistleblowers fight for transparency, democracy and the […]
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The privacy movement and dissent: Whistleblowing
This is the second blogpost of a series, originally published by EDRi member Bits of Freedom, that explains how the activists of a Berlin-based privacy movement operate, organise, and express dissent. The series is inspired by a thesis by Loes Derks van de Ven, which describes the privacy movement as she encountered it from 2013 […]
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Dissent in the privacy movement: whistleblowing, art and protest
This is the first blogpost of a series, originally published by EDRi member Bits of Freedom, that explains how the activists of a Berlin-based privacy movement operate, organise, and express dissent. The series is inspired by a thesis by Loes Derks van de Ven, which describes the privacy movement as she encountered it from 2013 to […]
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The EU must take action to protect whistleblowers
The right of citizens to report wrongdoing is a natural extension of the right of freedom of expression, and is linked to the principles of transparency and integrity. – Transparency International Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden are some of the most famous whistleblowers, thanks to their huge impact on the protection of human rights. However, there […]
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Proposed Espionage Act threatens free speech in the UK
The UK’s Law Commission has announced proposals that could mean journalists and whistleblowers are treated as spies if they “handle” official data. The ongoing open public consultation on the protection of official data, run by the Law Commission, suggests that the crime of espionage is changed so that it is “capable of being committed by […]
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Protecting whistleblowers – protecting democracy
Whistleblowing is defined as the “disclosure by a person, usually an employee in a government agency or private enterprise, to the public or to those in authority, of mismanagement, corruption, illegality, or other forms of wrongdoing”. Whistleblowers have become a trending topic since 2010, when Chelsea Manning disclosed around 700 000 military classified documents to […]
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Germany: Fighting the anti-whistleblower provision
EDRi observer Gesellschaft für Freiheitsrechte’s (GFF) most recent Constitutional Court case in Germany concerns an anti-whistleblowing provision threatening the freedom of the press. Part-time journalists and bloggers, as well as the legal or IT experts on which journalists rely, now risk a prison sentence of up to three years for handling “leaked” data.
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52 NGOs ask the Council to protect journalists and whistleblowers
On 13 May 2016, EDRi and 51 other civil society organisations sent an open letter (pdf) to the Heads of State and Government of the European Union to amend the draft Trade Secrets Directive, to protect our rights and freedoms, including those of journalists and whistleblowers. This call for change is of utmost importance. For […]
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Leaked documents: German news site Netzpolitik.org investigated for treason
If it were up to the Federal Attorney General and the President of the German Domestic Security Agency, two reporters of Netzpolitik.org, a German digital rights blog, would soon be in prison for at least two years. Yesterday, the news blog was officially informed about investigations against the editors Markus Beckedahl and Andre Meister. The […]
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