Blog

Ever whiled away five minutes on a Facebook quiz, finding out what cartoon character is your look-alike or how your IQ stacks up? These quizzes may seem like a perfectly harmless way to spend a few spare minutes. But have you stopped to think about what these quizzes are learning about you and how that info could be used? Take our quiz and learn more!QUESTION 1: When you take a Facebook quiz, the ... Read More

After your support drove the California Legislature to send a letter rejecting the Department of Motor Vehicle's proposal to begin embedding biometric information—face and fingerprint scans—into drivers' licenses, a senate subcommittee voted yesterday to delete the facial scan proposal from the DMV's contract with drivers' license providers.Senators Simitian and Lowell, who voted to delete the pro... Read More

A big thumbs up to the San José City Council for standing up for free speech and against censorship on Tuesday night and voting against the installation of internet blocking software on library computers.After 18 months of hard work by the ACLU, coalition partners, and concerned individuals like you who contacted Council members to support open access, free speech prevailed in San José. The City C... Read More

On Tuesday, April 21, at 7pm, the San José City Council will consider a proposal that would limit public access to important information by imposing filtering on the Internet terminals in public libraries. If you live or work in San José, please attend this meeting and join us in opposing this proposal.The Council meeting agenda includes a proposal by Councilmember Constant that would require the ... Read More

AT&T recently announced the launch of FamilyMap, a service that allows customers with a "Family Plan" to track the locations of other cell phones on the same plan.This is the kind of service that, whether well-intentioned or not, raises all sorts of privacy concerns: it can be used just as easily to monitor a partner or even a parent as to keep tabs on a child's location. Unfortunately, the se... Read More

Stanford Law School's Center for Internet and Society is hosting a panel event this coming Tuesday, April 7, from 5-7:30 p.m. about the ACLU of Northern California's new document, Privacy and Free Speech: It's Good for Business. The event is free and open to the public and a limited number of individuals may also attend via webcast. Panel from 5-6:30 p.m., reception to follow.Panelists: Andre... Read More

Privacy and Free Speech: It's Good for Business, released today by the ACLU of Northern California, is a first-of-its-kind publication offering hands-on tips for how businesses can build their reputations–while saving time and money–by properly protecting customers' privacy and free speech. The publication is based on dozens of case studies analyzing what prominent companies like Google, Yahoo!, Q... Read More

If you live or work in San Jose, please speak up for free speech and say no to library internet censorship!The San Jose City Council is deciding whether to install blocking software on library computers and endanger access to important information about healthcare, sexuality, art, and politics. If you live or work in San Jose, please tell the San Jose City Council and the Mayor that library Intern... Read More

Facebook, hardly a stranger to controversy, set off yet another firestorm recently when it changed its Terms of Use. The previous terms of service explicitly stated that Facebook's license to use user-created content expired as soon as the user deleted the content or cancelled her account:You may remove your User Content from the Site at any time. If you choose to remove your User Content, the lic... Read More

We have just won a victory for privacy and against biometrics, thanks to many of you!Thousands of faxes and emails from ACLU of Northern California members were critical in getting the California Legislature to send a letter rejecting the Department of Motor Vehicle's proposal to begin embedding biometric information — face and fingerprint scans — into our drivers' licenses.The DMV was trying to g... Read More

Today is the second annual Data Privacy Day, an international holiday "devoted to spotlighting computer privacy and protection issues." While Data Privacy Day is only two years old, warnings about online privacy have been popping up since 2000. Nearly a decade later, articles are still being published warning users about old and new risks to privacy online–and how we can protect ourselves.After al... Read More

People are talking about internet content filtering, especially since the ACLU won its case against the Child Online Protection Act (COPA), which tried to censor all speech about sex from the internet. But don't be confused between voluntary use of filters as an alternative to a criminal statute and governmentally imposed filters. ACLU First Amendment attorney Chris Hansen explains more about filt... Read More