Access Now Policy Team

Access calls on the Executive Branch to seize the opportunity to end the NSA’s bulk telephony collection program this week.

Earlier this week, Simon Davies, the “Privacy Surgeon,” published a global analysis of the impact of the Edward Snowden revelations over the past year. The report, entitled A Crisis of Accountability, demonstrates that, despite many strong and sweeping declarations, the overwhelming majority of the world’s governments have failed to take meaningful action in the wake of the Snowden revelations.

Vodafone, the world’s largest international mobile provider, released its “Law Enforcement Disclosure Report” today, which gives statistics on user data requests in 14 countries including Albania, Tanzania, Hungary, and other jurisdictions that have never before released this type of information.

“One year ago, we learned that the internet is under surveillance, and our activities are being monitored to create permanent records of our private lives — no matter how innocent or ordinary those lives might be…”

The South Africa-based telco MTN, which operates in 21 countries across the Middle East and Africa, recently released its first Group Human Rights Policy. MTN announced its support for user rights to privacy, security, communication and information, using the Access “Telco Action Plan” as a guiding policy document.

Deutsche Telekom discloses its 2013 requests from German law enforcement.

Last night, Brazil´s Congress approved the “Marco Civil,” a landmark piece of legislation comprehensively protecting human rights online.

Today, Access launched the Encrypt All the Things campaign to encourage widespread use of data security practices. The centerpiece of the campaign is the Data Security Action Plan of 2014 – 7 security-enhancing steps that companies can take in order to provide a minimum amount of protection to personal data.

Rule of law, legitimate purpose, non-arbitrariness, competent authority, oversight, transparency, and democratic accountability become US policy