This year, we fought back against the return of a terrible idea that hasn’t improved with age: site blocking laws.  More than a decade ago, Congress tried to pass SOPA and PIPA—two sweeping bills that would have allowed the government and copyright holders to quickly shut down entire websites based on allegations of piracy. The backlash was […]

Throughout 2025, EFF conducted groundbreaking investigations into Flock Safety's automated license plate reader (ALPR) network, revealing a system designed to enable mass surveillance and susceptible to grave abuses. Our research sparked state and federal investigations, drove landmark litigation, and exposed dangerous expansion into […]

You might not know it, given the many headlines focused on new questions about copyright and Generative AI, but the year’s biggest copyright case concerned an old-for-the-internet question: do ISPs have to be copyright cops? After years of litigation, that question is now squarely before the Supreme Court. And if the Supreme Court doesn’t […]

It's no secret that digital surveillance and other tech-enabled oppressions are acute dangers for liberation movement workers. The rising tides of tech-fueled authoritarianism and hyper-surveillance are universal themes across the various threat models we consider. EFF's Surveillance Self-Defense project is a vital antidote to these threats, but […]

EFF’s attorneys, activists, and technologists don’t just do the hard, endless work of defending our digital civil liberties — they also spend a lot of time and effort explaining that work to the public via media interviews.  EFF had thousands of media mentions in 2025, from the smallest hyperlocal outlets to international news […]

Drone as first responder (DFR) adoption really took off in 2025. Though the concept has been around since 2018, this year saw more normalization of the technology, its integration into more real-time crime center structures, and the implementation of automated deployment of drones. A DFR program features a fleet of camera-equipped drones, which […]

This year, you may have heard EFF sounding off about our civil liberties on NPR, BBC Radio, or any number of podcasts. But we also started sharing our voices directly with listeners in 2025. In June, we revamped EFFector, our long-running electronic newsletter, and launched a new audio edition to accompany it. Providing a recap of the week's most […]

In 2025, elected officials across the country began treating surveillance technology purchases differently: not as inevitable administrative procurements handled by police departments, but as political decisions subject to council oversight and constituent pressure. This shift proved to be the most effective anti-surveillance strategy of the […]

Defending encryption has long been a bedrock of our work. Without encryption, it's impossible to have private conversations or private data storage. This year, we’ve seen attacks on these rights from all around the world.  Europe Goes All in On Breaking Encryption, Mostly Fails (For Now) The European Union Council has repeatedly tried to pass […]

State and federal lawmakers have introduced multiple proposals in 2025 to curtail or outright block children and teenagers from accessing legal content on the internet. These lawmakers argue that internet and social media platforms have an obligation to censor or suppress speech that they consider “harmful” to young people. Unfortunately, in […]

It’s been a great year to be on EFF’s membership team. There's no better feeling than hanging out with your fellow digital freedom supporters and being able to say, “Oh yeah, and we’re suing the government!” We’ve done that a lot this year—and that’s all thanks to people like you.  As a token of appreciation for […]

Across ideologically diverse communities, 2025 campaigns against automated license plate reader (ALPR) surveillance kept winning. From Austin, Texas to Cambridge, Massachusetts to Eugene, Oregon, successful campaigns combined three practical elements: a motivated political champion on city council, organized grassroots pressure from affected […]

State legislatures—from Olympia, WA, to Honolulu, HI, to Tallahassee, FL, and everywhere in between—kept EFF’s state legislative team busy throughout 2025. We saw some great wins and steps forward this year. Washington became the eighth state to enshrine the right to repair. Several states stepped up to protect the privacy of location data, […]

A functioning patent system depends on one basic principle: bad patents must be challengeable. In 2025, that principle was repeatedly tested—by Congress, by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), and by a small number of large patent owners determined to weaken public challenges.  Two damaging bills, PERA and PREVAIL, were reintroduced […]

As reproductive rights face growing attacks globally, access to content about reproductive healthcare and abortion online has never been more critical. The internet has essential information on topics like where and how to access care, links to abortion funds, and guidance on ways to navigate potential legal risks. Reproductive rights activists […]

A tidal wave of copyright lawsuits against AI developers threatens beneficial uses of AI, like creative expression, legal research, and scientific advancement. How courts decide these cases will profoundly shape the future of this technology, including its capabilities, its costs, and whether its evolution will be shaped by the democratizing […]

Age verification mandates won't magically keep young people safer online, but that has not stopped governments around the world spending this year implementing or attempting to introduce legislation requiring all online users to verify their ages before accessing the digital space.  The UK’s misguided approach to protecting young people online […]

2025 was a stellar year for EFF’s award-winning podcast, “How to Fix the Internet,” as our sixth season focused on the tools and technology of freedom.  It seems like everywhere we turn we see dystopian stories about technology’s impact on our lives and our futures—from tracking-based surveillance capitalism, to street level government […]

Earlier this year, both chambers of Congress passed the TAKE IT DOWN Act. This bill, while well-intentioned, gives powerful people a new legal tool to force online platforms to remove lawful speech that they simply don't like.  The bill, sponsored by Senate Commerce Chair Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Rep. Maria Salazar (R-FL), sought to speed up the […]

The world has been forced to bear the weight of billionaires and politicians who salivate over making tech more invasive, more controlling, and more hostile. That's why EFF’s mission for your digital rights is crucial, and why your support matters more than ever. You can fuel the fight for privacy and free speech with as little as $5 or $10 a […]

In 2024, EFF wrote our initial blog about what could go wrong when police let AI write police reports. Since then, the technology has proliferated at a disturbing rate. Why? The most popular generative AI tool for writing police reports is Axon’s Draft One, and Axon also happens to be the largest provider of body-worn cameras to police […]

The US legal profession was just one of the pillars of American democracy that was targeted in the early days of the second Trump administration. At EFF, we were proud to publicly and loudly support the legal profession and, most importantly, continue to do our work challenging the government’s erosion of digital rights—work that became even […]

Each December we take a moment to publish a series of blog posts that look back at the things we’ve accomplishes in fighting for your rights and privacy the past 12 months. But this year I’ve been thinking not just about the past 12 months, but also over the past 25 years I’ve spent at EFF.  As many folks know, I’ve decided to pass the […]

Since earliest days of computer games, people have tinkered with the software to customize their own experiences or share their vision with others. From the dad who changed the game’s male protagonist to a girl so his daughter could see herself in it, to the developers who got their start in modding, games have been a medium where you don’t […]