Publications

It's Too Complicated: How the Internet Upends Katz, Smith, and Electronic Surveillance Law

Author(s): 
Stephanie Pell
Publication Date: 
June 7, 2016
Publication Type: 
Other Writing

For more than forty years, electronic surveillance law in the United States developed under constitutional and statutory regimes that, given the technology of the day, distinguished content from metadata with ease and certainty. The stability of these legal regimes and the distinctions they facilitated was enabled by the relative stability of these types of data in the traditional telephone network and their obviousness to users. But what happens to these legal frameworks when they confront the Internet? Read more about It's Too Complicated: How the Internet Upends Katz, Smith, and Electronic Surveillance Law

The U.S. wants to maintain cross-border data flows. That may be tough.

Author(s): 
Henry Farrell
Publication Date: 
June 2, 2016
Publication Type: 
Other Writing

"Karen Kornbluh, the former U.S. ambassador to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), has a new cyber brief making the case for open cross-border data flows at the Council on Foreign Relations website (full disclosure: I authored an earlier brief in this series). Kornbluh argues that foreign jurisdictions pose an increasing threat to open flows of data across networks such as the Internet. Read more about The U.S. wants to maintain cross-border data flows. That may be tough.

A First Amendment For Social Platforms

Author(s): 
Nabiha Syed
Publication Date: 
June 2, 2016
Publication Type: 
Other Writing

The great 21st-century platforms — Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Snapchat, and the rest — have this year found themselves in the middle of the speech wars. Twitter is struggling to contain vile trolling and harassment, and Facebook has gotten scalded on the little toe it dipped into curating journalism. Read more about A First Amendment For Social Platforms

It’s important for SF to get body-camera rules for police right

Author(s): 
Catherine Crump
Publication Date: 
June 1, 2016
Publication Type: 
Other Writing

After months of consideration, the San Francisco Police Commission approved rules Wednesday for use of the latest innovation sweeping law enforcement nationwide — police body-worn cameras. Toney Chaplin, San Francisco’s acting police chief, had announced on his first full day in the job last month that deploying body cameras was his top priority. Read more about It’s important for SF to get body-camera rules for police right

Spying on Muslims is bad policy

Author(s): 
Brian Nussbaum
Publication Date: 
May 23, 2016
Publication Type: 
Other Writing

During the presidential primary, U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz suggested increased surveillance and policing of Muslim neighborhoods in the United States. This suggestion has rightly provoked the ire of many people across the political spectrum. Even more than being out of step with American values, these strategies are counterproductive to good counterterrorism policy. Read more about Spying on Muslims is bad policy

Should You Be Allowed to Prevent Drones From Flying Over Your Property?

Author(s): 
Ryan Calo
Publication Date: 
May 22, 2016
Publication Type: 
Other Writing
NO: It Is the Way to Kill Innovation

By Ryan Calo

The year is 1910. Orville and Wilbur Wright are testing their plane and happen to fly hundreds of feet over a stretch of land you own. Could you sue them?

Technically, you could. In 1910, your property rights extended ad coelum et ad inferos—up to heaven and down to hell. Anyone who flew over your property without permission was trespassing. Read more about Should You Be Allowed to Prevent Drones From Flying Over Your Property?

Online tracking: A 1-million-site measurement and analysis

Author(s): 
Arvind Narayanan
Publication Date: 
May 22, 2016
Publication Type: 
Academic Writing

Online tracking: A 1-million-site measurement and analysis is the largest and most detailed measurement of online tracking to date. We measure stateful (cookie-based) and stateless (fingerprinting-based) tracking, the effect of browser privacy tools, and "cookie syncing". 

This measurement is made possible by our web measurement tool OpenWPM, a mature platform that enables fully automated web crawls using a full-fledged and instrumented browser. Read more about Online tracking: A 1-million-site measurement and analysis

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