Shahid Buttar
EFF
San Francisco, CA, United States
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Past articles by Shahid:
Alavaro Bedoya Highlights the Critical Connection between Civil Liberties and Civil Rights
Earlier this month, Georgetown Law Professor Alvaro Bedoya delivered the U.S. Senator Dennis Chavez Memorial Lecture in Law & Civil Rights at The University of New Mexico School of Law, titled “Privacy and Civil Rights in the Age of Facebook, ICE, and the NSA.” His remarks neatly encapsulated... → Read More
The Inextricable Link Between Modern Free Speech Law and the Civil Rights Movement
No excuse is needed to celebrate the civil rights icon Rev. Fred Shuttleworth. But this weekend is an especially appropriate time to recognize his contributions to First Amendment jurisprudence, and the inextricable link between modern free speech law and the civil rights movement of the 1950s and... → Read More
Antitrust Enforcement Needs to Evolve for the 21st Century
Yesterday, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) announced the creation of a new task force to monitor competition in technology markets. Given the inadequacies of federal antitrust enforcement over the past generation, we welcome the new task force and reiterate our suggestions for how regulators can... → Read More
National Emergencies: Constitutional and Statutory Restrictions on Presidential Powers
When a president threatens to exercise the power to declare a national emergency, our system of checks and balances faces a crucial test. With President Trump threatening such a declaration in order to build his proposed physical border wall, that test could be an important one that could... → Read More
Principles for Corporate Platforms in the Gig Economy
From ride-hailing platforms like Lyft and Uber, to sites like Airbnb, FlipKey, or VRBO that enable occupants to rent properties, the so-called sharing or gig economy is expanding and disrupting industries from hotels to taxis. Cities across the U.S.—and the rest of the world—are facing a daunting... → Read More
Election Security Remains Just as Vulnerable as in 2016
The ability to vote for local, state, and federal representatives is the cornerstone of democracy in America. With mid-term congressional elections looming in early November, many voices have raised concerns that the voting infrastructure used by states across the Union might be suspect, unreliable... → Read More
EFF Tells Bay Area Regional Transit: Reject Proposed Face Surveillance Scheme
Around the country, communities concerned about privacy and surveillance are seeking to secure a robust role for public community oversight to constrain the co-optation of local police departments by electronic surveillance. EFF supported recent victories for community control in Oakland and... → Read More
California Can Pioneer Local Community Oversight of Police Surveillance
For nearly a decade, a company known as Harris Corp. managed to sell sophisticated military surveillance equipment to police departments across the U.S. without any elected policymakers knowing that their tools even existed. A proposed law in Sacramento could ensure that this history never repeats... → Read More
Illinois Declines to Adopt Proposed Arbitrary Drone Surveillance of Protests
Observers often forget that surveillance offends not only privacy, but also the right to dissent. A recently defeated Illinois bill illustrates how First and Fourth Amendment rights intersect, by proposing to undermine the right to dissent not obliquely, but rather directly. That’s why EFF joined... → Read More
Net Neutrality Needs You as Much as You Need It
Net Neutrality Needs You as Much as You Need It The battle for net neutrality is ramping into high gear, as we anticipate an FCC vote on December 14 to either confirm or reject Chairman Pai’s draft order to undermine the 2015 Open Internet Order. With the future of the Internet, its... → Read More
Proposed “Right to Know Act” Would Empower Users of Digital Devices to Decline NYPD Searches
New York City is considering a range of legislative measures to increase civilian control over the New York Police Department (NYPD). Earlier this year, EFF endorsed the proposed Public Oversight of Surveillance Technology (POST) Act to increase transparency into the NYPD’s acquisition of... → Read More
National Security Agencies Are Evading Congressional Oversight
Last week, federal officials from several spy agencies engaged in a full court press in Washington, spinning facts before media outlets, flooding Capitol Hill with lobbyists, and bringing lawmakers to the National Security Agency's (NSA) Ft. Meade headquarters to feed them selective information... → Read More
LinkNYC Improves Privacy Policy, Yet Problems Remain
Since first appearing on the streets of New York City in 2016, LinkNYC’s free public Wi-Fi kiosks have prompted controversy. The initial version of the kiosks’ privacy policy was particularly invasive: it allowed for LinkNYC to store personal browser history, time spent on a particular website, and... → Read More
FCC Chair’s “chat” with tech execs draws protest
This Tuesday, FCC Chairman Ajit Pai will visit the Bay Area, supposedly for a “fireside chat” with tech executives about bridging the digital divide for underserved communities. But Chairman Pai’s brief tenure to this point has been defined by actions that undermine digital rights, such... → Read More
West Coast Jurisdictions Advance Community Oversight of Police Surveillance
This summer, two of the west coast’s largest metropolitan areas—Seattle and California—took major steps to curtail secret, unilateral surveillance by local police. These victories for transparency and community control lend momentum toward sweeping reforms pending across California, as well as... → Read More
Expansive Protections Against Police Abuses Win Approval in Providence
On Thursday night, the capital of the smallest sta → Read More
Oakland City Council Committee Advances Measure to Require Transparency and Public Process for Surveillance Tech
On May 10, the Public Safety Committee of the Oakl → Read More
In Providence, Policymakers Delay Visionary Local Civil Rights and Civil Liberties Reforms
Recent events in Providence, RI demonstrate both h → Read More
A Municipal Vote in Providence for Police Reform Carries National Implications
After three years of sustained community mobilization and advocacy, the Providence City Council in Rhode Island voted this Thursday to unanimously approve among the most visionary set of policing reforms proposed around the country to protect civil rights and civil liberties, including digital liberties. → Read More
Dissent Made Meaningful
Over the last year, large numbers of Americans have grown politically active for the first time. Reflecting the depth of our constitutional crisis, however, many seem not to know how to meaningfully raise their voices or participate in the political process. Civic Participation Beyond Elections Turnout in American elections has remained abysmally low for decades, suggesting some degree of either… → Read More