Archive

Hundreds of millions of sensitive records have been compromised by data breaches. If your personal records were compromised by a breach, wouldn't you want companies to be required to tell you important information about the breach and how to protect yourself?Then ask Governor Schwarzenegger to sign SB 1166, which standardizes the details that must be disclosed to security breach victims.California... Read More

While the ACLU of Northern California and Facebook both agree that location information is very sensitive, we disagree that Places gives users adequate control of how and when to share this information. (Next time I visit my hometown, I'd like to be able to hang out with some of the Facebook crew at the Nut House without being asked again and again and again if I want that shared with everyone nea... Read More

Following Facebook's announcement today about its new location-based product, Places, here's what the ACLU of Northern California has to say on the privacy front:Facebook made some changes to its regular privacy practices to protect sensitive location-based information, such as limiting the default visibility of check-ins on your feed to "Friends Only." But it has failed to build in some other imp... Read More

Last Friday, the district court in the Western District of Washington granted the motion to intervene that the ACLU filed on behalf of our clients in the lawsuit challenging the North Carolina Department of Revenue's (DOR) repeated requests for Amazon's customer records in the course of its tax audit of Amazon. These customer records reveal highly personal and intimate details of people's lives th... Read More

Got a cell phone? Use Facebook? What about Gmail? Read books on your shiny new iPad? Did you buy that new iPad online?Since you're reading this on some kind of electronic device, we're guessing that you can answer "yes" to at least a few of those questions.Which is why it's crucial that you drop everything you're doing right now and take our Privacy Quiz!It's fun, it's short, and unlike pop quizze... Read More

Earlier today, Facebook announced the rollout of privacy settings for mobile users. Providing privacy controls for mobile users is important and we hope that more companies will take this step. We were also pleased to see that these new Facebook mobile controls are even better than the normal web interface in some ways.But on the flip side, they are missing a few key elements that are crucial for ... Read More

The American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California will join thirty one other ACLU affiliates around the country today in asking the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to make public the details of a new FBI program created to collect and "map" information about racial and ethnic demographics, "behaviors," cultural traditions, and "life style characteristics" in local communities with co... Read More

On June 16, ten of the nation's top privacy organizations sent a joint letter to Facebook detailing outstanding privacy concerns. Facebook's response glossed over many of the critical points raised about necessary next steps. The following reiterates our concerns and addresses Facebook's response to our June 16 letter. We look forward to discussing these issues and Facebook's plans in more detail ... Read More

On June 23, 2010, the National ACLU intervened in a lawsuit filed by Amazon.com against the North Carolina Department of Revenue (NCDOR) for its unreasonable demand for customer purchase information.In December 2009, as part of a tax audit, the NCDOR requested the records of Amazon.com customers in that state for purchases made between August 1, 2003, and February 28, 2010. Amazon compli... Read More

Today the ACLU of Northern California (ACLU-NC) and a lineup of ten of the nation's top privacy groups sent an open letter to Facebook calling for the social networking giant to fix remaining issues concerning user privacy and control. Facebook recently took steps to address some privacy problems, but the groups contend more needs to be done. They are urging Facebook to demonstrate commitment to i... Read More