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You're listening to radio station WBAI New York the time is 7 o'clock time once again for off the hook
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A very good evening to our program is off the hook
Emmanuel Goldstein here with you on this Wednesday evening joined tonight by Rob T. Firefly. Good evening, Alex
It is I and Kyle howdy
Well, we all made it through the State of the Union address and the Super Bowl within two days of each other
a couple of snooze fests, I guess or things that had you outraged depending on your your beliefs and
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Pledge there. This is over confusing to me. Don't we make enough money at the station from the commercials that we are
Well, you see yeah, you are confused. We do not have commercials. We've told you this Alex
We we do not have commercials on this radius now. Yeah, we're at ninety nine point five FM
We're in the middle of the FM dial. We're a full power station
We've reached four different states and we're in the middle of New York City. We could have commercials. Yeah, we could
but if we had commercials Alex
Would I be able to stand up?
Doing now and say in a in a in a rather serious tone of voice
Verizon sucks
Microsoft sucks
Ford sucks Trump sucks. It also you couldn't do that
You know why because those those sponsors
Would not let you do that they'd be upset the listeners would be upset because
They'd be a different kind of listener. That's exactly what they would want you to think. Mm-hmm. Exactly
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I mean, I'm really amazed, you know, obviously I was being sarcastic about the commercials, but it were you though
Were you really you don't believe in miracles?
Uh-huh. This is a miracle that this station continues to exist without commercials in the middle of the spectrum. It is a miracle
It's you know, and I don't use that term lightly
There aren't many stations that that do that and certainly not in the middle of the FM dial lots of times radio stations
Are pushed over to the left-hand side of the dial below 92
Where you you can't have commercials we actually could at this frequency have commercials, but it would be wrong and it would do it
Defy what this station has stood for for more than 50 years going on 60 years actually
So, um, yeah, it's it's our listeners that we depend on if we if we lose our listeners we lose everything and and that's just how
It is other radio stations. They just worry about the sponsors if they lose the sponsors, they lose everything listeners
They don't really matter all that much. Yeah on the way in here
We were turning around the dial
Especially the a.m. Dial because I like to explore a.m. Radio, you know, there's three Chinese radio stations in New York right now on a
That's pretty cool
But there's also all these talk stations and every single one of them is is conservative and that's in New York
That's in New York City
Conservative radio and and there's no liberal a.m
Radio stations that I can find in New York now imagine what it's like in the rest of the country
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you didn't really view that news story or
That that bit of technology like what we talk about week after week
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You know
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Respect to the strand again. I'll re-announce that our public hearing and we would love WBA
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I know it can happen believe believe it or not, right?
So we're still fighting with the Landmarks Preservation Commission. Our next public hearing is going to be February 19th
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Even though a New York Times story came out about our fight with Landmarks Preservation Commission
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We were here before talking about this before the New York Times here on WBA
I please support the station 5 1 6 6 2 0 3 6 0 2 and again when is that hearing?
That's February 19th at 1 Center Street 9 a.m. In the morning on the 9th floor
Okay, we will be on again, hopefully
Again before that hearing so we'll be able to go into more detail on that
but just for those who may have missed our
Earlier episode where we had Nancy Bass Wieden owner of the strand as a guest if you go back into our archives on
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You'll want to look for the November 28th
2018 episode and
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Keep it keep it coming. In fact, you can go to
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Listen to a time capsule and hear how things have changed over the years both
technologically politically socially
It's just it's it's really fascinating. So tonight we're going to be focusing on one of the true gems of
Of not only the Internet but of civil liberties and I'm referring to the electronic frontier foundation
formed in
1990 I remember those days like they were yesterday and
It's it's an organization that has done so much good continues to do so much good and is such a vital resource
On so many fronts we won't be able to even scratch the surface in in the hour ahead
But we're gonna give it a try. We're gonna try as hard as we can joining us on the phone is
EFF tech projects director Jeremy Galula Jeremy. Are you there? I'm here happy to be here. Thanks so much
You know, we were looking over the website EFF
We've done it many many times
But just really going going through it the fine-tooth comb and we can't figure out how you guys are able to be involved in so
Many things because there really are so many projects so many things to be concerned about and I think you know
A lot of a lot of normal people like us just get overwhelmed and and and feel like we can't possibly keep up with it
How do you guys do it? I?
mean it takes a lot of work, I mean we are a
Organization where gosh almost a hundred people now sometimes people look at what we're doing
I think oh, you must be thousands of people. We're we're not even a hundred
And that's only pretty recent and we just we work hard we we keep an eye on
everything we can
Wow, okay. Well, I'll give you the the opportunity to pick a project or a campaign that is currently being worked upon
But we're gonna talk about a whole bunch of them
But is there anything that that's fresh on your mind?
So one we actually literally just launched yesterday is a campaign to target. I think it's eight Democratic
Congress people
they are
Pretended there are rumors that they are offering instead of capitulating to President Trump's demand for a physical wall that they're saying
man, not a physical wall, but we'll give you a tech wall instead and
That is a euphemism for more surveillance at the border including up to a hundred miles within the u.s. Border
And so we are targeting them and trying to convince them that a surveillance wall is not a improvement over a physical wall
So that's one that is fresh in my mind
And we we need all the help we can get to convince those Congress people that this that's more surveillance at the border
I was a hundred miles inland is a bad idea, right? I was looking that over on your site actually
Increased mass surveillance including at the border threatens everyone's civil liberties
Yet some congressional Democrats looking for alternatives to Trump's demand for a border wall are offering a border security proposal. We've all heard this
Suggesting expanding surveillance at the border and I have to say, you know in the in the media. Nobody's really
criticizing this nobody's really
Picking it apart as as we are doing right now
Now
Your site says I could lead to new funding for technologies that invade the privacy of immigrants travelers and American citizens living near the border
Now while Congress couldn't should not
counter President Trump's calls for physical wall with a tech wall
Unchecked use of surveillance tech undermines everyone's right to privacy, especially the most vulnerable members of society
We stand with more than two dozen civil liberties groups who have told
Congressional Democrats that we oppose such measures and that proposal suggests new cutting-edge technology, which can include everything from
automated license plate readers known as
ALPRs
Which collect sensitive location data from everybody who drives by them?
US Customs and Border Protection already deploys ALPRs not just at the US border
But as you mentioned that internal checkpoints as far as 100 miles inland also the new cutting-edge technology could expand
Existing biometric screening of travelers the federal government already
conducts face surveillance of all travelers and and we notice that in airports now both US citizens and foreign nationals on
international flights other threats include iris scans voice prints collection of DNA information and
given the sensitivity of biometric information
EFF is concerned about the threat that any collected data will be stolen or misused as well as the potential for such programs to expand
Beyond their original scope, but Jeremy it's more than then than just worry about about it being stolen
It's also the misuse within those very organizations, correct?
I'm sorry. I didn't have you up this. Oh
Sorry, go ahead and start again. I didn't have you turned up. Oh, yeah, so we're absolutely we are worried about the misuse within organizations
I mean we've seen time and time again that
When the government collects data for one purpose unless there are very strong laws against, you know reuse of the data
And there aren't in this case
It can be reused and shared with law enforcement
And so, you know, we're concerned that innocent American citizens are gonna have their data scooped up and then
you know the FBI or
You know a state agency will call up the Fed and say we'd like the data that you have on this person
And so it isn't yeah, it's not just will the data get stolen because it inevitably will I mean
The government is not immune to data breaches
And so yeah, it's a big worry
You know, you make a great point
I mean and it's so easy to point to these major data breaches that have affected the government and particularly
sensitive areas of data
You'd like SF 86 data SF 86 are the national security questionnaires that you have to fill out
when you're applying for a security clearance the OPM breach that happened several years ago, which was
Perpetrated through basically a bogus domain name, which OPM should have been able to detect quite easily, but did not
You know resulted in the release of massive amounts of SF 86 related data, and that's extraordinarily sensitive
I mean, that's where you have to detail your drug usage. You have to detail your foreign national contacts
Even things like misuse of information technology. I had two separate security clearances in my life
one from the intelligence community one from the defense
with the Department of Defense and
Because of that OPM breach. I actually got two data breach notification letters from the government
so, you know
Copies of my SF 86 are probably floating around somewhere in China along with tens of thousands of other people that worked in this area
And it's a huge problem. We just can't trust the government to safeguard this particular information
Once that information is out there can be weaponized by foreign intelligence organizations criminal organizations
And this is this particular surveillance wall
I thought you guys did a great job of identifying the issues in a really concise manner on the EFF's website
And it really seems to me like these eight Democrats that that may capitulate to
Trump and I want to ask you who they are number one
But but also Jeremy it seems to me like it's more about the optics than anything else
You know, a wall is something physical that you can see it's ugly. We don't want it on the border. It represents a
symbol of
Isolationism and maybe xenophobia that we don't want to project but what is it about digital surveillance?
That you think is particularly pernicious or creates a drag now
And what do you think that that says about us as a culture as opposed to a physical wall?
I mean it what's particularly pernicious is that you you probably wouldn't even notice as as you alluded to a
Digital or a tech wall a surveillance wall because it's not going to be I mean you'll notice some things like if
If you have to provide your fingerprint to exit the country or something like that
Or you're a US citizen and they start requiring you to provide your fingerprint or something like that to enter the country
But there are parts of it that you won't notice like when you're when your car is picked up by an automatic license plate reader
There's no notification to you like I mean they have license plate readers that are meant to be disguised as like traffic cones and like
construction ladders
you wouldn't notice one of these cameras unless you were really really looking for it and
Chances are when you're driving you should be paying attention to the road. Not that
And so I think that's part of it is just this this
sort of
Sneaky way that the data can be collected without people's consent with and with and even more so without people's knowledge
Whereas and and to be honest, I think that's to some degree why the Democrats are proposing this which is unfortunate
Because they just they want to win the political battle
About you know, we didn't give Trump his wall and look you can't see a wall. Therefore. We didn't give Trump his wall
And they're sacrificing in turn people's ability to move around freely near the border
Without being monitored. And so I that's I mean, that's really the the
Fundamentals of the concern for us. Do you see alternatives and things that they can
Compromise on as far as border security that don't involve this
So I mean to be to be honest
That's a little outside of area EFF areas of expertise like we are not border security experts
That's you know, I'll be totally upfront about that. Like we don't have a position on immigration
but when it comes to when someone suggests something that then implicates civil liberties and
Privacy and surveillance, that's when we jump in and so
It it is a little tough in that we don't have you know, good solutions for the Democrats is a different way to compromise
But we know that for sure this is not it
Good good points, you know
There's long-term consequences of this type of surveillance technology being so pervasive in our society
when it comes to children that I think we forget about these days too because we grew up in a time and I think
Given your background in your educational history Jeremy probably around my age. I would guess
You've accomplished a tremendous amount
We should call you. Dr. Galula
But
In any event, you know, I have a five-year-old child and the other day
he was creating with these magnetic blocks a
Structure a building and then he put these things on the side of the buildings and he explained to me
He said daddy. Those are their surveillance cameras. Those are the security camera
And I couldn't believe it that this is this is what he thinks
Ordinarily go on bill. What are you indoctrinating your kid with this is just his natural way of you know
Viewing the world and seeing it and it's terrifying nothing natural about that. I think it is
This is what's happening with kids now
They are becoming accustomed to being constantly under surveillance and believing that they're CCTV
Everywhere around them and you think of it go you go to any store and you look up at the at the ceiling
There's 20 30 surveillance cameras around everywhere. You go you walk down any Street in Manhattan
Every townhouse has surveillance cameras outside of them. Every buzzer has surveillance cameras
Well, I mean, that's the thing that Jeremy was mentioning the the ALPR. It's a license plate readers
They're hidden in traffic cones or everywhere. We somehow got used to that did Jeremy did we lose that battle?
Is there any way to keep that from being something common in our lives?
So I think I I don't think we've lost that battle a good example of that is here in California where EFF is based
I've been a couple years now gosh, it's kind of surprising
We actually got some laws passed and that
require
Anybody not just government, but anybody that for example uses a automatic license plate reader to publicly post some information
So we get at least get some transparency about who is using this what they're using it for what types of?
Security safeguards they've put in place etc. And so, you know, it will always be an ongoing battle
But we never give up hope
We are we are always confident that there's more we can do that's a really good point getting more
more information more particulars because that's part of
the problems with with data handling when a lot of these things are implemented, especially if it's
It's managed by a third party or some kind of contractor
outside of the the government
In addition to particulars on how it's used and shared
We know from you know leak
Stories recently and
In the way, these things have gone when it's in the government's interests or in other words
It doesn't look so good for them. They get very concerned about how things are shared internally and
reconfigure
credentials at DOD or wherever
Whatever bureaucratic organization it is, but if it's in private hands
Unless there's something up front telling you how it's handled how it's managed how it's protected
That alone becomes an area of vulnerability
To say nothing of the scope changing and and the data being used and misused
In in say a new light for a different purpose and and when that when we don't have answers about that
It's additionally a concern. Are you getting much in the way of?
answers when you confront these
Representatives
So so far, I mean we
When talking about this, you know the surveillance wall, we literally just launched the campaign yesterday
And so I think it's it's still ramping up
Hopefully we're they're starting to pay attention. I don't know off the top of my head if just how much
Interaction we've had since we launched it. Basically. We just launched it just before the State of the Union last night
So hopefully they're starting to pay attention and the more that people you can actually if you want to you want to help us out
With this you can go to act dot EFF org
And it's the first action you can take right there
You just scroll down a little and it's you know
No tech wall reject new funding for border surveillance. If you click that we can you can tweet it your
representatives your senators
and
Tell them that this is not the right way to compromise
Yeah, it's really crucial to get get that out there get the discussion going and have those questions answered by our politicians and not just
Have sort of an open open bar open tab on on
and wholesale
Relinquishing of our rights we're speaking with Jeremy galula the tech projects director over at the electronic frontier foundation and
As we mentioned they're involved in so many projects
We just spent well over five minutes talking about one of them so you can see we're not going to get to
Even a good fraction of them
But I feel this is a good point to step in and and let people know what it is
We're offering tonight for a fundraiser to keep WB AI going and also to spread some awareness about what the electronic frontier
Foundation is up to for a pledge of $100 at 5 1 6 6 2 0 3 6 0 2 you'll get a special
EFF package now
What does that include includes an autographed copy of Lawrence Lessig's book code and other laws of?
Cyberspace Lawrence Lessig is an American
academic attorney political activist very well known in the community and
code and other laws of cyberspace is a
Fascinating book about
Implications for copyright law
Cyberspace changes not only the technology of copying but also the power of law to protect against
Illegal copying goes so far as to argue that code displaces the balance in copyright law and doctrines such as fair use
We can go on and on what's what's included in that but it's a fascinating read
But that's only only one of the items you will also get the end of trust
which is another
compendium with all kinds of
writers that have contributed
including
List in front of me Rob, do you have it?
I have some of it the end of trust is actually issue 54 of McSweeney's quarterly concern if you're familiar with McSweeney's the well-respected
literary journal and
Just some of the people this is their first nonfiction issue their first entirely nonfiction issue of McSweeney's and it's this amazing compendium
Edward Snowden has written in it get Gabriella Coleman Hope speaker and past guest on this program
Dozens and dozens of these luminaries. I think you've got some more
Yeah, I think Cory Doctorow another hope speaker actually a keynote speaker that we had at hope
I guess it was four years ago, wasn't it? Also very well known in the community Bruce Schneier
And the executive director of EFF Cindy Cohn
You know, it's just it's kind of an amazing compendium of essays
By really smart well-known people the kind of stuff that you know, it's not gonna put you to sleep
Immediately certainly not. Yeah, absolutely. Not probably a little bit frightening to read I would imagine as well
And you know, it's just you don't get that many luminaries stuffed into one issue
I think really ever know this is this is a really cool offer and that's still just item number two in this package item
Number three is the EFF sticker pack now the sticker pack basically is an assortment of topical EFF stickers
Including the NSA spying eagle. I do not consent to the search of this device
And also this is really cool
Something called a laptop camera cover set
basically adhesive stickers
designed to protect you from visual surveillance by covering the lens of your laptop camera and other devices and
They have a unique ultra removable adhesive so it prevents gummy residue on your lens
Which is a lot better than masking tape, which I know a lot of people use
So it's it's not just you know, covering it up with with a piece of tape
This is something that's specially designed. I believe Rob you you have some information on how not to do that, right?
There was there was a fun tweet by the EFF on February the 1st
the NSA
That many of you may have heard of a famous three-letter government
Organization is among these these organizations that if you go to various tech events and conferences and things
They'll they'll give away swag and a popular piece of swag these days is a little plastic cover for your webcam
The NSA was giving out these purple ones, but the EFF noticed that these webcam covers were actually translucent
You could you could print you could kind of see through them and they posted a picture of this and tweeted to the NSA
At NSA at NSA gov the webcam covers you're giving out have an interesting defect
The purple ones are transparent and they posted the photo and stuff
And of course, they referred to these stickers which are part of this package
We're giving away that the EFF make which are actually not translucent. Do you think that was that was done on purpose?
That the NSA did it on purpose. They do like to spy on people. They like spying it
It's kind of funny that they were giving out webcam covers in the first place when they're part of the reason that I think
Some people want to have a webcam cover either they they did it on purpose or even the NSA doesn't know how to do it
Properly in any event these stickers will will protect you and it's it's it's done the right way
But wait, that's still not all because one more item in this amazing package is the EFF beanie. That's right
It's a hat that proudly says EFF on it
It's a white embroidery on stretchy double-layered black acrylic hats measure seven point five by eight inches
and
That is just an amazing package all of that and did I mention also the Lawrence Lessig book is autographed code and other laws of
cyberspace
So you get two books you get a hat you get a sticker package all for a pledge of $100
We have a limited number five one six six two zero three six zero two. This will pretty much
solidify your support
For all kinds of civil liberty issues online and for WBAI as well five one six six two zero
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Support off-the-hook support EFF support WBAI
support freedom of thought and ideas and
Individuality and all sorts of nice things like that. Don't forget your donation and
Contributions tonight are tax-deductible
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You can really you can contribute any amount. This is a package at a particular level, but it doesn't really matter
There's no cap and there's really no minimum ten bucks
If you if you make a basic donation tonight will allow you
every bit as much of
Membership and get allow you to enjoy as much more of the great programming here at WBAI and Pacific radio
So, please don't feel limited to just this package. It's really our way of saying
Thank you, and you can also pay a certain amount
Each month and and stretch it out over a year
so there's all kinds of options the important thing is that you make that phone call to five one six six two zero three six zero two and
Support WBAI because this is how we stay on the air and have conversations like this
And and let me tell you something about this sticker pack actually with the anti-surveillance stickers
Those things have a lot of longevity. I've been using the same stickers for about five years from the EFF sticker pack
I mean, they just they go on and off very very easily. They're extraordinarily effective. You can use them on multiple devices
You don't have to have it covering your camera the entire time
You can have it on the back your phone put it on the cover of your camera
It will outlast your version of Windows it outlasts your phone. You know, it will outlast several of your phones
It's a it's a really low-tech but effective anti-surveillance piece of technology
Awesomely designed Jeremy does everybody in the EFF office use these stickers
For the most part we well until we decided to try out the the NSA camera covers
And then we discovered that they were some of them. Not all of them are translucent
But the purple ones definitely seem to be a little translucent which makes me think it was a hilarious accident more than anything else
Yeah, imagine that. How do you how do you cut off access to the microphones though?
Yeah, that's a lot harder
You know, there are projects out there which have hardware kill switches for both cameras and microphones
But it makes it a not many products have that unfortunately, which is yeah, it's sad
Well, I'll look to the EFF to be the first to come out with something that most people can use
So, okay. We've talked about one issue. Let's let's move on to another one. And that's a depressing one net neutrality
The FCC's so-called restoring internet freedom order which repealed net neutrality rules
Relies on a flawed understanding of how the internet works the FCC based its order on the belief that certain functions
Inherent to operating an ISP qualify ISPs as information services under the Communications Act not
Telecommunications services the courts have already ruled that net neutrality rules can only be applied to telecommunication services
As Kevin Russell the attorney representing public interest and interest groups on the plaintiff's side explained
The FCC has absurdly tried to separate internet access from functionality that's necessary to providing that internet access
specifically
caching and domain name services known as DNS
These technologies are implementation details of how the internet works not separate services in their own
Right, the FCC's insistence that DNS lookups are a separate class of services is dishonest in the old days
Telephone companies had operators manually connect users for long-distance calls and those operators could also give callers information
This didn't mean that Bell was providing an information service on top of the telecommunications layer
The operators like DNS were there because they had to make the telecommunications work seamlessly for a user
Simply because they can also provide information didn't make them a fundamental part of the technical
Implementation and as EFF has pointed out the FCC's false distinction between internet access service and a distinct
Transmission service is utterly ridiculous. And I I hear that this is what we've been saying for a long long time now
But Jeremy I have to ask the question again
Is this a battle that's already been lost?
Just the opposite actually we got so the there was the first time
Well, I think the only oral argument which is when the lawyers actually get to stand up and talk in front of a judge
in the FCC case
Last Friday and the judges were asking some pretty
pointed questions to the FCC
At one point one of the judges asked so because one of the arguments the FCC has made is meh
Don't worry about it. Consumers will be protected if ISPs do something bad then the FTC the Federal Trade Commission
can
Protect consumers and so a judge said, okay, fine. Let's test this theory. So say I'm
Comcast or Verizon and you know some video provider, you know, Hulu Netflix or whatever comes and says
I'm gonna pay you these bags and bags of cash and in return I want you to not only speed up my content
I want you to slow down my competitors
And so if this happened the judge asked like could the end and the ISP put it in its terms of service
You know all that fine print and said by the way people can pay us to speed up or slow down
content and so the judge said if the if a ISP did that would that be
illegal under the rules or would the
FTC with the Federal Trade Commission be able to do anything about it and the FCC lawyer basically had to sheepishly answer
Nah, it'd be there's nothing we could do
It'd be legal the FTC wouldn't be able to do anything about it
Which is a strong sign that the judges are really worried that this is precisely the sort of thing that'll happen and
There's no the repeal of net neutrality prevents any sort of protection for consumers about it
So I actually think you know, that's a good sign that the judges are thinking there, you know, they're asking the pointed questions
And that as a result at you know, I think it's a battle that we're actually on the way to winning
Yeah, and and Jeremy I presume that that case was in the DC Circuit or it was before a panel
Yep, I mean and those are extraordinarily smart judges. They understand
administrative law
With a level of expertise that no other court in the country has they're known
Basically be you know for this expertise because that's where all the federal agencies are located
So the fact that the judges were asking these really pointed questions, I think does not bode
Well for the government's position here. I think it buttresses your conclusion that this is certainly not a battle that is lost already
You know in response to Emmanuel's question and and more to the point, you know
This kind of goes back to the State of the Union last night where Trump was out there touting the fact that he has rolled
Back, you know hundreds or thousands or whatever the hell it was that he said of regulations
I like how he said regular not unnecessary regulations just regulations
By default regulations are bad. Well, exactly. Well, that's exactly my point. You mean you're making it for me here
You're messing up my narrative flow. That's what I'm here for. I know I know tell me about it
But the judges seem to be indicating that some of these types of regulations that have been rolled back are actually bad
especially when the FTC would not have any authority to police this kind of thing because if they put it in a
Terms of service or terms of use and adhered to those particular terms
They wouldn't be necessarily dealing with a deceptive trade practice if it's if it is
Out there in the open even if it's technically hidden within a terms of service
Well, so I go ahead Rob I just yeah this really speaks to why
Organizations like the EFF are so important, especially nowadays. I mean since the very beginning of this program on WBA I
The big struck the one of the major struggles of the whole hacker worlds that that we're involved in is that the people making the
rules around these things don't know a damn thing about the technology and how things actually work in the real world and
so like having having people like the EFF to
Not only put in the work and get out there and announce to the general public
How things work and and how things are crazy or not crazy
But actually follow up and follow up with the people in control with the the people in in government and judges and all these other
Entities and just say hey, you know in case you're unfamiliar
this is how the actual technology behind what you're what you're legislating is and
That's that's that's completely vital. I
Mean that is one of my my favorite things about working at EFF is
You know
We got to put as you know leading up to this back before the the repeal actually went through we got to put together a
List of over a hundred and ninety engineers including some real internet luminaries who said to the FCC
You know, it's not just EFF making these arguments where the people who actually wrote the code who invented the damn Internet
Sorry, I guess I can't curse on on life. Oh, that's certainly that's certainly. Okay. Don't worry about that
The darn Internet and you're not explaining how it works correctly FCC
You have no under you're twisting how it works in order to make it fit this legal
You know into this legal jigsaw puzzle that just doesn't make any sense
and I just I love that we're able to
To collaborate and work with the hacker community to be able to make statements like that to say it's not just some you know
Advocacy organization like EFF. These are the real people who are the real engineers and they're saying you've got it wrong
No for the non lawyers amongst us and I know you're not a lawyer either
Maybe you could explain this for people that
Don't know as much as as EFF and and so many other experts on the subject
How come we couldn't have this conversation a year ago and prevent this from happening in the first place?
So we tried actually we we have absolutely so in the run-up to the FCC deciding to repeal net neutrality
They had to do what's called a notice of proposed rulemaking, which is a fancy way for saying they had to
Announce to the to the country what their intention was
And then ask for feedback and we gave them feedback that the the letter I mentioned is for example
one of the the pieces of feedback that they got amongst the
Millions and millions of comments they got from everyday individuals
Just normal people across the country who said don't repeal net neutrality
And then they just decided to ignore everybody and listen to the big ISP
Well, they also got a whole bunch of those
They also got a whole bunch of of carbon copied ones that were being created by some computer somewhere
Yeah, that was that's you know, that's it. That's a tricky issue because
There were some organizations like EFF like we were helping we had a system that was designed to help people write comments to the FCC
But then there were
definitely sort of carbon copy
Comments that were being sent to the FCC as well
And that's a that's a whole nother can of worms. That is just really really ugly
Yeah
just with that particular kind of worms there were people who found out that comments had been made in their name by
Who knows who like saying no no get rid of net neutrality
there were comments made in the names of deceased people and things like that and
Then when confronted with that the FCC seemed strangely unable to investigate or care really so so Jeremy
What what stage are we in now with the whole net neutrality fight?
What comes next?
so after now that the oral arguments have been made we're basically waiting for the the
DC Circuit the Court of Appeals to issue a decision
and
that could take we I've talked to some of the
Attorneys and they think that'll probably be by the end of the summer and that sounds incredibly long to into technologists like me
Who's like what you know write it up put it out there?
But supposedly that the lawyers tell me that in the in the greater scheme of things in terms of judicial
Decision-making that's actually incredibly fast
So I'll take their word for it, and we will wait with bated breath to see what they
How they were convinced by the end of the summer, but right now as of this moment net neutrality is is not protected
It's not a thing on the internet in the United States correct
Correct have have you guys noticed any adverse effects already I?
Mean to be honest the ISPs were already starting to do some some pretty sneaky things even before this
One of the things that they I mean in the run-up to the repeal of net neutrality
And they're continuing to do it. I mean one of the big ones that really sort of
irritates us is
They continue to market these unlimited internet plans, and then if you look at the fine print unlimited doesn't mean unlimited data
It means we'll give you so much high-speed data
And then we're going to throttle you after that regardless of whether there's congestion on the network
Or or what and so that's been something that they've been very eager to do to try and pretend that they're unlimited
And then you know shall basically
Give consumers short shrift as a result
You know to give folks an idea of just the massive amount of things that Electronic Frontier Foundation is involved in we're talking about
Net neutrality now just one topic
But it falls under a category on the EFF website known as creativity and innovation topics and just to give you a set
That's just one of the categories
One of the sections
But they have all these all these projects all these things that are constantly being updated and people are working on
Things like fair use the broadcast flag coders rights project
competition copyright trolls
Defend your right to repair digital radio digital video the DMCA DRM
File sharing fixing copyright Hollywood versus DVD. I know that one well
No downtime for free speech open access patents reading accessibility
Reclaim invention right of publicity
SOPA and PIPA internet blacklist legislation terms of abuse test your ISP the six strikes copyright surveillance machine
trademark trusted computing and video games
That's just one section all those things are being worked upon
I don't know how you guys do it. I know I keep saying that but it's you must really be inspired to
to fight for these things
We believe in the cause I mean everyone at EFF has a passion for digital civil liberties
I mean and and that includes the people you know even down to the you know our accountant
Has a passion for digital civil liberty even though you know and it's critical what she does
You know people at EFF want to get paid, and you know what their paychecks to come in on time. Oh, that's right
It's everyone you know our
Operations folks the the people who keep our servers running do an amazing job the people who design our website
I mean our our graphic designer has a passion for digital civil liberties, and it's great
He puts out some amazing artwork, so it's it's really wonderful, and we can't emphasize enough in addition to supporting WBA
I please people support EFF EFF org
There's all kinds of ways you can contribute and and help them out as well. They've been around since
1990 Jeremy how did you get involved?
I've got mine is almost the well almost the weirdest story EFF my background is actually has nothing to do with digital civil liberties
I was actually worked a lot in high school and college on robotics
But as I was doing that you know I was just another sort of tech geek and robots happened to be my neat thing
I wanted to play with I loved programming robots
But I was reading stories
I was listening to programs like this and realizing
Holy crap the the people who are running our country don't have a a single idea about how technology works
And that bugged me and eventually I decided you know as much as I love
Programming robots, and I could you know go work for a company and work on autonomous cars or drones
What really bugged me and what I really wanted to change was making sure that that civil liberties were defended in the digital world
And so I applied to an EFF job
And lo and behold they said you know doesn't matter that you don't have a civil liberties background what we need are smart people
Who can learn quickly and have a passion for this and so they they hired me?
And as a matter of fact we're hiring now if there's you know if you are a
Hacker a coder an engineer a technologist you just like making things we've got a position open
For on our tech projects team now we need a JavaScript developer
So and I don't doubt that there's a listener out there someplace probably many listeners that that would jump at the opportunity
How do people apply for this?
You just go to I believe it's just EFF org and there's a place where you can see
about and opportunities
I don't know if jobs that EFF org works. I don't know that that doesn't work
Hey, you're a hacker out there. You figure it out if you can find where it was posted
it's on the EFF website and we've got a
Post right now for a tech staff technologist a JavaScript developer
We've also got a post if you're not technically minded, but you're passionate about these things
And you're especially if you're a good writer
we've got an activist position a privacy and surveillance activist position that's open and
Again, you don't have to have a ton of background in this space what really matters is are you smart?
And are you passionate? Are you willing to to really fight for these things?
That's awesome. That's really really good to hear and again a reminder to our listeners
Please if you are enjoying this conversation if you're learning from this conversation
Please support the radio station by calling five one six six two zero three six zero two
We're offering a special EFF package tonight
filled with all kinds of items autographed copy of Lawrence Lessig's code and other laws of cyberspace a
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You'll be reading that for a good long time
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digital rights
And and civil liberties and things like that also a way to protect
Yourself from surveillance by covering up your camera in the right way
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Three six zero two is the phone number again
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But most importantly the reason you should call five one six six two zero three six zero two is to support the radio station
So that we can have these kinds of conversations. You don't hear this on those AM radio stations
We were talking about before they don't want to touch this they don't want to talk about these issues
You won't even hear this on other non-commercial stations because might be a little bit
You know conflicting with some of the underwriters that they have we don't have these concerns. We don't have underwriters
We have listeners, and those are the only people that we have to worry about
Steering in the wrong direction or giving bad information
That's why we we we seek out the best and we try to provide as much accurate information as possible
Well speaking of which and you may and you may disagree with this Emanuel
But I would like to go out on a limb and say I think this is actually one of our better
Fundraiser shows that we've ever done
And I think it's in large part because we have somebody like Jeremy from the EFF here talking about these issues
That are literally right at the forefront of national politics
They were you know bleeding-edge last night as Donald Trump went on and on about this nonsense about these caravans coming in and
And the need to have this type of idiotic surveillance technology at the border
I mean, this is really really good stuff our
Package tonight is an encapsulation of all of that expertise that is there at the EFF
and I think that the EFF and WBII go hand-in-hand together because
We need people like you Jeremy on the show
And I think the EFF needs outlets like WBII to continue to exist so that your message can get out there
By supporting the station by calling five one six six two zero three six zero two
pledging a hundred dollars if you can do it you get this great package like Kyle had mentioned earlier if you can if you can't
Do a hundred dollars and you want to do five dollars you want to do one dollar you want to do ten dollars?
Anything helps if you want to do five hundred dollars to that
Just so people know you know
We don't have an upper limit and of course we still have the other option which does not come with this premium package
But which comes with convenience
At the wazoo you can be a BAI buddy
Which is signing up to donate any amount of your choice a small amount a large amount whatever is comfortable for you
And you will automatically donate that on a monthly basis and give us something
Which is amazing in the listener supported world, which is a dependable segment of income
so if you go to give to WBAI org or call five one six six two zero three six zero two and
Investigate the BAI buddy program you can be part of that these fun drives are essential there would keep us on the air
So please I know it's you know it can be a pain to hear us asking for support
You hear it a lot from so many different places
But in our case you really are the only source of that support
And if we're doing a good job if we're if we're having a conversation that you are interested in if you're learning from
Not only this, but what we broadcast the other weeks of the year
Please give a call to five one six six two zero three six zero two we have so many different ways that you can contribute
We take all major credit cards. You know to give to WBAI org give the number to WBAI org
ask for the electronic frontier foundation package for a pledge of $100 and
You will be quite happy with that now. We have Jeremy on the phone from the electronic frontier foundation
We've been talking about only a couple of issues. I mentioned some of the the sections on the website in addition
We have the transparency topics security privacy
International topics free speech topics all of which we don't have time to get into but I would like to ask in the closing minutes
That we have here
about Facebook because I know that
Facebook is a big issue
In in recent weeks certainly and from a piece on the EFF website once again Facebook has broken the trust of its users this time
through reportedly paying people to give up their privacy by installing an application that sucks up huge amounts of sensitive data and
explicitly sidestepping Apple's
Enterprise developer program rules and in doing so the company has repeated several of the privacy abusive practices that has been chastised for before
This underscore is just how little the company has learned from a year of user complaints privacy group criticisms and congressional hearings and
Emphasizes the need for legislators to pass new laws to protect the public Jeremy
I have to ask do you do you think Facebook even cares anymore?
I think they care a little bit. I mean they know that something is going on
I don't think they care enough quite frankly otherwise. They wouldn't have let this continue on
So they I think it is taken all of these
Basically privacy scandals. It's actually funny on one of our walls in the office. We have a little wall a little
White board where we say you know days since the latest fight the Facebook privacy scandal
It's kind of like you know days since the latest accident or whatever
And it's at zero more often than not it has ever gotten to double digits
I don't think so a couple times a couple times. It has gotten to double digits, but not often, okay
I think that was you know that was maybe over the holiday break when nobody was actually you know publishing any interesting news or something
Everyone was you know taking a break?
Yeah, so I?
Think they're starting to realize, but they're definitely not at the point where they're really doing anything extremely positive or
Making any significant changes. Well. How can users protect themselves from organizations like Facebook from social media?
Invasions of their of their privacy
So one easy way you can do it EFF actually puts out a tool
So this is a tool developed by the folks on my team, and this is a team of
Coders and technologists it's called privacy badger, and it's an extension for
Chrome or Firefox that you can install and it'll block
Facebook's third-party tracking as well as other third-party tracking all over the web
And so that's one way it's not gonna
You know obviously what you do on Facebook Facebook is gonna know about but it's like when you're browsing to different other websites
That Facebook might be tracking you and this will this will stop that tracking in its tracks pun intended
Great and one other project. I really feel we should mention is the let's encrypt project you guys are involved in
You want to tell you something about that?
Yeah, so let's encrypt so for a long long time
it was really hard to get make your website secure to get that little lock icon make it encrypted make it you go over HTTPS and
basically EFF along with Mozilla and the University of Michigan decided realize we were all working on this problem at the same time and
Decided to launch our own certificate authority that would give away free HTTPS certificates do it
Automatically and then give write the software so that people would be able to do this without needing to be like
Deep security experts because we really wanted to just raise the bar
I mean, you know it's not gonna make your site hack proof
But it is going to raise the bar of security generally and so we've issued something like a hundred and forty million certificates
Oh my god
Wow since we've launched. I mean it's you can see if you go to let's encrypt org
There's a stats page there, and you can see
Exactly how well how well it's going and so that's that's been a huge huge win on our part
I thought you're gonna say a hundred forty thousand, but that's that's incredible and it's been a godsend to organizations like ours
Because you know that they were they were charging huge amounts of money just to get that little icon
the thing on on the URL and
You know it's why why would you trust those people to say that you're trustworthy you know?
It was a problem that we all had but this is something
I think we can all stand behind, and it's it's awesome you guys did that
Yeah, that that I think is one of the I mean to me. It's one of the biggest successes of VFF
I mean in the past something like four or five years
We've gone from 30% of page loads being secure to now almost 80%
And that's across the world based on telemetry from Firefox
That's that I just think that's huge in just encrypting the web well Jeremy our thanks go to you and to the
Entire electronic frontier foundation for all that you have been doing and all that you are continuing to do
and I just hope that people realize this and
Support your organization and help make you stronger because as much as we've needed you in the past
We're going to need you even more in the future
Well, thank you very much, and thanks for giving us
Here at EFF a place to get our message out. We really appreciate it. Good luck with your funding drive
Thanks very much, and we'll talk to you again
Jeremy Galula the tech projects director at the electronic frontier foundation and again
Let us give out our phone number 5 1 6 6 2 0 3 6 0 2 for a pledge of $100
you'll get the EFF package which consists of two books and
The EFF stickers the EFF hat it's it's an incredible package. It really is and
Jeremy mentioned that EFF graphic designer some wonderful work done on these stickers, and yeah
They're attractive and useful and send a real message
Yeah, and in case you have to ask for the exact name of it
It's it's known as the electronic frontier foundation package and again. We have a limited number
I don't know if we even have any left
But the number to call to support the radio station in any event 5 1 6 6 2 0 3 6 0 2
That's going to do it for us tonight. You can write to us OTH at
2600.com
We'll see you next time. Good night
It's
Town to Midtown trying to get downtown
But I'm not getting close. I'm just running running around
Always in my bed
Oh
I
Don't
I
Don't