eff

Ars analyzes EFF's lawsuit against President Bush and Bush administration officials who approved warrantless NSA wiretaps.

EFF's chances for success hinge on a single question: can computers eavesdrop?

The Church of Scientology is rather notorious for its heavy-handed responses to any critics -- often using copyright claims to stop them from criticizing the organization.

The latest is that the EFF is reporting that over 4,000 critical videos have been taken down off of YouTube due to DMCA takedown notices issued by an organization named American Rights Counsel, LLC.

Strong copyright system supporters have always tried to push aside fair use. Sometimes they pretend it doesn't actually exist.

Sometimes, they claim that it stifles creativity.

However, in the last few years, they've pretty much aligned their talking points on fair use.

OStatic: "So how do you know if your ISP is playing fast and loose with your packets? That's where Switzerland, a new tool from the EFF, comes in."

Aiming to highlight ISP’s and their shaping, the EFF has released a new tool for users to test their connection’s integrity.

Last week, we wrote about the ridiculous concerns being raised by a few privacy advocates that (gasp!) Google doesn't include a link to its privacy policy on the front page.

This seemed like a really pointless concern since almost no one reads these privacy policies anyway, and those who do often misunderstand the policy anyway.

The DMCA lets copyright holders send takedown messages to various sites, demanding allegedly infringing content be taken offline.

It's been rather successful in doing that. A few years ago, a great site, Chilling Effects sprung up to track all sorts of takedown notices (not just having to do with copyright, but any kind of cease & desist threats -- though DMCA takedowns are common).

Last summer, we wrote about the EFF suing Universal Music for sending a DMCA takedown notice to YouTube over a 30-second home video of a baby dancing to some barely audible music by Prince.

The EFF claimed that this was an abuse of the DMCA, as the use of the music was clearly fair use.

A ruling in a long-running copyright infringement case brings good news for the RIAA, as a judge supports the group's argument that merely offering a song for distribution is enough to infringe the distribution right under the Copyright Act.

The EFF tells Ars that the ruling will "grease the wheels" of the RIAA's litigation machine.

Last month, we wrote about a bill proposed in the Senate that would outlaw phishing even though phishing is already illegal.

If it merely restated that phishing was illegal, that would be one thing (a basic waste), but it also added some other points that were problematic, including taking away the right to anonymity in registering domain names.

It turns out the bill may actually be much worse than that -- but it may depend on how it's read.