Promoting And Protecting Digital Rights Since 1994
EFA is an independent non-profit association that relies on membership subscriptions and donations. If you’re concerned about digital rights in Australia, please join or donate today.
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Secret TPP Talks Continue at Luxury Hawaii Hotel
Trade ministers are meeting behind closed-doors at the Westin Resort and Spa in Maui this week to finalise the terms of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). This is the first formal round of talks since the US passed the controversial Fast Track trade legislation in June, which has given US negotiators a renewed sense of determination as they continue to push TPP’s corporate-driven mandate on intellectual property and digital regulations. The…
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European Data Retention Laws: an update
This table was produced by Leanne O’Donnell – a senior lawyer and leading legal expert in the communications sector. You can follow Leanne on Twitter: @mslods. See also the original article on her website. The Australian Government looked to the European experience as a model for its data retention scheme, and also claimed the European examples as justifications for our own legislation. As Attorney-General Brandis said in July 2014, data retention…
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EFA welcomes ALP decision to review data retention legislation
EFA welcomes the Labor Party’s decision to adopt an amendment to its platform that calls for a review of the data retention legislation passed in March this year. As a long-standing opponent of mandatory data retention, EFA remains committed to rolling-back the worst aspects of this legislation, including the unjustifiably long retention period of two years and the routine collection of mobile phone location data. EFA is also committed to…
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EFA supports call to avoid criminalisation of cryptologic research
EFA supports the call by the International Association for Cryptologic Research (IACR) for amendments to the Defence Trade Controls Act to include clear exemptions for scientific research and for education. Australia’s Defence Trade Controls Act was recently updated and now prohibits the “intangible supply” of encryption technologies, and hence subjects many ordinary teaching and research activities to unclear, potentially severe, export controls. EFA Chair David Cake said today, “while it is…
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Happy 25th Birthday, EFF
A quarter of a century ago this week, ignorance and overreach on the part of government officials led to the founding in San Francisco of the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), as an organisation dedicated to protecting and promoting civil liberties in the emerging digital world. As the first ‘digital rights’ organisation, EFF has played a central and critical role both within the US and around the globe in holding back…
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Vale Caspar Bowden
It was with great sadness that we heard of the death last week of Caspar Bowden, privacy activist. Caspar had a long history of privacy advocacy, and was particularly notable in both the fight for public access to strong cryptography in the 1990s and the current fight against mass surveillance. He was co-founder and director of the Foundation for Information Policy Research (a UK-based privacy think tank), former Chief Privacy…
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What We Do
Policy
We actively monitor a number of policy areas and specific issues. The topics below provide a detailed view of EFA’s policy positions.
Copyright
Australia’s copyright laws are outdated, inflexible and not fit for the digital age. As such, EFA is a long-standing supporter of reform of Australia’s Copyright Act.
Privacy & Security
Privacy is fundamentally about consent and control over access to information, and goes hand-in-hand with security. Privacy is a human right.
Censorship
Adults should be able to make their own informed decisions about what content they create and consume.
Encryption
Access to encryption technologies is vital for individuals and groups to be able to safeguard the security and privacy of their information.
Internet Safety
Surveillance is not safety. Safety for whom, against what? This complex problem is more likely to be exacerbated, rather than solved, by measures that allow for unaccountable surveillance and the undermining of communications security.
Surveillance
EFA is committed to ensuring that Australian’s home life is not subject to arbitrary interference.