The Center for Internet and Society at Stanford Law School is a leader in the study of the law and policy around the Internet and other emerging technologies.
By Riana Pfefferkorn on March 29, 2019 at 1:56 pm
On Wednesday, Senators Wyden (D-OR) and Cotton (R-AR) introduced a bipartisan bill that, if passed, will enhance the Senate Sergeant at Arm's ability to defend Senators and their staff from cyber threats. Read more about Protecting Senators from Cyber Threats
By Daphne Keller on March 25, 2019 at 4:52 pm
The EU’s proposed Terrorist Content Regulation gives national authorities sweeping new powers over comments, videos, and other content that people share using Internet platforms. Among other things, authorities – who may be police, not courts – can require platforms of all sizes to take content down within one hour. The Regulation also requires even small platforms to build upload filters and attempt to proactively weed out prohibited material. Read more about The EU's Terrorist Content Regulation: Expanding the Rule of Platform Terms of Service and Exporting Expression Restrictions from the EU's Most Conservative Member States
By Brett Frischmann on February 19, 2019 at 12:00 am
Q: What do you do when you see a little button on a webpage or app screen that says I agree?
A: Click the button.
The familiar and incredibly simple click-to-agree mechanism is ubiquitous. We encounter it throughout our digital lives. It is nothing less than the “legal backbone” of the internet, app stores, e-commerce and so much more.
Yet electronic contracting and the illusion of consent-by-clicking are a sham. Read more about Electronic Contracts and the Illusion of Consent
By Joan Barata on February 18, 2019 at 12:30 am
The new EU Audiovisual Media Services Directive (AVMSD) has been officially adopted and published. it is now time for member States to start the process of incorporating its provisions into their respective legal and institutional frameworks. Read more about New EU rules on video-sharing platforms: will they really work?
By Ryan E. Long on February 16, 2019 at 3:38 pm
You are CEO of Google. When you wake up tomorrow morning, your general counsel calls you: "we've been sued in the E.U. for copyright infringement! The claim: our search results for Le Parisien and dozens of other newspapers used more than one word and/or beyond a 'short extract.'" Your response: "is this April Fools’ day?" Read more about You've Been Sued In The E.U. For Copying A "Short Extract"!
By Riana Pfefferkorn on February 14, 2019 at 4:37 pm
On February 11, a federal court in Fresno denied a motion to unseal that I had filed last November along with the ACLU, the ACLU of Northern California, and the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Read more about Court Refuses to Shed Light on Government’s Attempt to Break Facebook Messenger Encryption
By Joan Barata on January 31, 2019 at 12:17 pm
The present submission has the object of providing comments and recommendations regarding a very specific provision included in the document mentioned in the title, that is the specific proposed duty for intermediaries to:
“deploy technology based automated tools or appropriate mechanisms, with appropriate controls, for proactively identifying and removing or disabling public access to unlawful information or content.” Read more about Submission Regarding the Draft IT Intermediaries Guidelines Proposed in India
By Riana Pfefferkorn on January 30, 2019 at 2:04 pm
As I mentioned in my previous blog post, 2019 is shaping up to be a big year for increased transparency in our nation's courts. At CIS, we've had a whirlwind month of activity in several different cases: Read more about Wrapping Up a Month of Court Transparency Efforts
By Daphne Keller on January 28, 2019 at 9:00 pm
I have a new article coming out, called Who Do You Sue? State and Platform Hybrid Power over Online Speech. It is about free expression rights on platforms like Facebook or Twitter, which the Supreme Court has called “the modern public square.” One section is about speakers suing platforms. It looks at cases – over thirty so far – where users argue that companies like Facebook or Twitter have violated their free expression rights by taking down legal speech that is prohibited under the platforms’ Community Guidelines. Read more about Online Speech Rights and the Supreme Court's Pending Halleck Case
By Albert Gidari on January 26, 2019 at 12:00 am
TechCrunch asked a panel of eight privacy experts: “Has anything fundamentally changed around privacy in tech in 2019? What is the state of privacy and has the outlook changed?” Here's what I said in response.
