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The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) was founded in July of 1990 to ensure that the principles embodied in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights are protected as new communications technologies emerge.
Since its inception, EFF has worked to shape our nation's communications infrastructure and the policies that govern it in order to maintain and enhance First Amendment, privacy and other democratic values. We believe that our overriding public goal must be the creation of Electronic Democracy, so our work focuses on the establishment of:
EFF sponsors legal cases where users' online civil liberties have been violated. The Steve Jackson Games case, decided in March of 1993, established privacy protections for electronic mail and publications that are kept online. We continue to monitor the online community for legal actions that merit EFF support.
EFF provides a free telephone hotline for members of the online community who have questions regarding their legal rights.
Members of EFF's staff and board
speak to law enforcement organizations, state attorney bar associations
and university
classes on the work that we do and how these groups can get involved.
EFF has been working to make sure that common carrier principles are upheld in the information age. Common carrier principles require that network providers carry all speech, regardless of its controversial content. Common carriers must also provide all speakers and information providers with equal, nondiscriminatory access to the network.
In 1992, the FBI introduced draft legislation to require communications technologies to be certified as open to lawful government surveillance before those technologies can be deployed. EFF organized a broad coalition of 39 computer, telephone and public interest groups to oppose this measure. In August of 1994, the FBI draft was sponsored as a bill in both houses of Congress, and EFF played a major role in limiting the authority the bill aimed to grant to the FBI, as well as assuring that new privacy protections were added to the legislation.
EFF is working to convince Congress that all measures that support broader public access to information should be enacted into law. For example, the law that establishes citizen access to information, the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), does not require government agencies to turn over the electronic version of information, which is often the most useful version, or information stored only online. EFF supports an Electronic Freedom of Information Act and other legislation to make information more accessible to citizens.
EFF supports both
legal and
technical means to
enhance privacy in communications. We therefore
advocate all measures that ensure the public's right to use the most
effective encryption technologies available.
EFF has been working with policymakers to establish a national digital infrastructure, a network of networks, capable of transporting video images and data, as well as voice. Our Open Platform Proposal" (OP) advocates a network that is accessible to all citizens at an affordable price. For the near-term, EFF supports the implementation of ISDN (Integrated Services Digital Network) technology. ISDN makes it possible for the current telephone network to be used to send voice, video and data at a low cost to consumers.
EFF has written a white paper that describes ISDN applications that are currently available for use at home, school, the workplace and beyond.
EFF has been
working with Congress on legislation that encourages individuals and
organizations to
create tools that make the Internet and the National Research and
Education Network (NREN)
easier to access and use.
EFF, in conjunction with the Consumer Federation of America and the American Civil Liberties Union, coordinates and sponsors the Communications Policy Forum (CPF). CPF enables nonprofit organizations, computer and communications firms, and government policymakers to come together in a nonpartisan setting to discuss communications policy goals and strategies.
In order to foster community and openness, EFF works with local organizations that support online communications issues. In January of 1993, EFF sponsored a summit of groups from around the country to discuss common goals. We also sponsor ACTION and other online forums for organizations and individuals that share our interests and goals.
EFF has been a funder and organizer of the annual Computers, Freedom and Privacy (CFP) conference, where academics, civil libertarians, law enforcement officials and computer users all meet to discuss the privacy implications of communicating online. Each year at the conference, EFF presents its Pioneer Awards to individuals who have made significant contributions to computer communications.
EFF publishes a frequent electronic newsletter, EFFector Online, that is sent to subscribers at their e-mail addresses and distributed via Usenet's comp.org.eff.news newsgroup. We also publish a quarterly hardcopy newsletter, Networks & Policy, archived on our Internet servers for online reference.
EFF maintains several communications forums on the Internet. We have our own Internet node, eff.org, which houses our FTP, gopher, and WWW servers, as well as our Internet "mailing list" conferences, including comp-org-eff-talk. EFF also maintains online conferences on the Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link (WELL), CompuServe (CIS), America On Line (AOL), GEnie (GEIS), and elsewhere.
The EFF BBS, started in March 1994, carries a wide selection of the files
available on our Internet server.
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