A new report from the Government Accounting Office reveals that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) plans to nearly triple the number of surveillance towers along U.S. borders, from the current 830 to 2,300 by 2034.

DHS expects to expend $1 billion in taxpayer dollars for this dangerous expansion of a surveillance network indiscriminately trained on towns, school playgrounds, backyards, and vehicles—threatening the privacy and civil liberties of everyone in the border regions.

The towers are planned as part of DHS component Customs and Border Protection’s (CBP) Integrated Surveillance Tower (IST) program, which captures images of people and vehicles. The IST program operates autonomous surveillance towers, consisting of autonomous surveillance towers, consisting of AI-based systems using radar, thermal infrared and optical systems to track targets over long distances; integrated fixed towers, optimized for surveilling foot traffic and vehicles; and remote video surveillance systems, which can often be found very close to the border fence in Arizona, including residential neighborhoods where cameras are capable of spying on homes on both sides of the border. (For a description and photos of these technologies, see EFF’s updated guide to surveillance at the U.S.-Mexico Border.)

DHS expects to purchase more long-range autonomous towers and to upgrade existing towers with autonomous capabilities. The $1 billion comes from the so-called One Big Beautiful Act—a massive tax and spending law that President Trump signed in 2025, the report says.

The explosive expansion of border surveillance is a digital dumpster fire for human rights and civil liberties. It’s not just surveillance towers; drones, aerostats, surveillance vehicles, ground sensors, game cameras, and license plate readers are also part of the vast taxpayer-funded infrastructure that threatens all those who live, work, or seek refuge in the borderlands. This technology isn’t exclusive to U.S. federal agencies: it’s also deployed by state and local law enforcement, and even by governments on the Mexican side.

Since 2022, EFF has studied and mapped surveillance technology along the U.S.-Mexico border using public records research, open-source intelligence, and fact-finding trips, and created a handy interactive map to provide researchers and journalists with the tools they need to analyze the impact of U.S. border security policy. We have also documented the different types of surveillance technology in a zine, "Surveillance Technology at the U.S.-Mexico Border." We updated the publication earlier this year to help people identify the machinery of homeland security by adding more models of surveillance towers, newly deployed military tech, and a gallery of disguised trail cams and automated license plate readers.

EFF’s work includes defending the rights of individuals whose devices have been searched or seized upon entering the country; pushing back on the collection of biometric and social media identifiers; and developing digital security guidance for people crossing borders.

With the web of surveillance tech at the borders about to explode, EFF will continue to investigate and expose it and find ways to fight back with the communities that live in the shadow of this technological threat to human rights.

There’s a new boogeyman in the battles over AI: so-called “stealth crawlers.” We’ll admit it—the term “stealth crawlers” sounds quite nefarious. In reality, they’re anything but.

“Stealth crawlers” are simply automated tools to access and collect public web data—without disclosing the user’s identity. Private crawlers like these facilitate all kinds of important work that benefits the public, including investigative reporting, academic research, cybersecurity protection, and more.

Many publishers want to unmask crawlers anyways—and are pushing for new legislation that would give them new powers to do so. These legislative proposals threaten the open web, user privacy, and valuable research without directly addressing the problems they’re supposedly intending to solve.

Alarmingly, these harmful proposals are gaining traction. The New York state legislature has already passed such a bill, the NY Stealth Crawler Protection Act, which is now on Governor Hochul’s desk. We expect to see similar bills introduced in other states, and potentially in Congress. That’s a big problem for the open web—and the many benefits it provides.

Anonymous crawling is worth protecting

Anonymous crawling enables some of the most publicly beneficial uses of the open web. Researchers, journalists, and other watchdog groups use unidentified automated tools to gather the information necessary to hold powerful institutions accountable and protect the public.

Anonymous crawling fuels important investigative journalism. For example, The Markup, a non-profit news site, used anonymous crawlers to investigate potentially anti-competitive practices by tech companies, such as Amazon’s tendency to prioritize Amazon brands and Amazon-exclusive products over competitors with higher ratings. The crawlers identified themselves as ordinary Firefox browsers to web servers, which allowed The Markup to understand how Amazon search results pages would appear to ordinary users. Similarly, ProPublica used an automated tool designed to simulate an ordinary Amazon customer to reveal that the site steered shoppers to more expensive products over cheaper alternatives.

Anonymous web scraping is also crucial for cybersecurity professionals, who use automated tools to monitor the web for information that helps them protect against malicious attackers. Privacy tools, including EFF’s own Privacy Badger, also crawl sites anonymously to identify trackers without compromising user privacy.

However, without the ability to scrape anonymously, these tools would likely be blocked. Sites can—and do—block crawlers operated by researchers, journalists, and activists who criticize them. For example, Facebook shut down accounts belonging to researchers who used automated tools to study misinformation on the platform and demanded that they take down published research. Many sites block automated access by anyone who hasn’t paid to crawl public webpages.    

Unmasking crawlers threatens the open web

News publishers—and their allies in government—say that unmasking crawlers is necessary to protect news organizations from technological strain caused by AI-related crawling, and fears that AI could reduce news sites’ traffic and ad revenue. These are legitimate concerns.

But enacting broad, reactionary restrictions on automated access is not the answer. Legislation targeting anonymous crawling threatens the open web, user privacy, and valuable research without actually addressing these technological and potential economic harms of scraping.

The New York state legislature recently passed the NY Stealth Crawler Protection Act, a law that would make it illegal to crawl news websites without revealing who is operating the crawler and all possible future uses of the data collected by the crawler. The law would give websites the power to obtain court orders that unmask anyone using an unidentified crawler—without any evidence that they broke the law.

Laws like the New York bill sweep far beyond AI, and do not meaningfully address the technological or potential harms of AI-related web scraping. These policies would chill beneficial crawling by allowing publishers to veto lawful public access, giving them the power to block not just bad actors, but also security professionals, researchers, dissidents, or anyone who has not paid for a license to view public text. This needlessly undermines the free and open internet.

Digital news publishers—like most websites—face real technological challenges in the AI era. While web crawling has been around for decades, with the proliferation of AI, crawlers now collect far more public web data than they used to. This pushes servers closer to their maximum capacity, and if some bots collect information too aggressively, they may strain web servers to the point that it degrades site performance. The problem is not anonymity—so unmasking crawlers won’t solve it. The real problem is overaggressive crawling, which can be effectively addressed with technical measures that target harmful conduct without impeding anonymous access to information.

A better path forward

There are other, far less harmful ways to protect publishers from the harms these “stealth crawler” laws claim to target. Addressing the harms of AI-related crawling requires policies that narrowly target the causes of these issues–without undermining free expression and the open web. Policies that target crawlers and scrapers are anything but.

Reversing course, Flock Safety—the surveillance technology vendor most known for its extensive network of automated license plate readers—has announced that it will end a pilot for its acoustic gunshot detection devices to identify signs of “human distress.”

In October 2025, EFF warned the public that Flock was rolling out a new feature called “Distress Detection” that would be deployed through their acoustic gunshot detection devices (formerly known as Flock Raven, now called Audio Detection). This feature purported to use high-powered microphones scattered throughout a city to search for sounds of human distress, with original advertisements from the product indicating it would search for “screaming.” (Since the publication of our original blog post, Flock quietly amended the ad on this webpage to say “distress” instead of “screaming.”)

Now, Flock has published a blog post stating that “[a]fter careful consideration and community consultation, we decided to remove the feature.” Good riddance. 

We said it when the product was announced and we’ll say it again: this was a misguided and dangerous feature because of the civil liberties concerns it poses, the possibility it could summon armed police to every loud interaction happening on the street, and because in several places this type of spying would be illegal under state eavesdropping laws. 

We were not quiet about this potential new feature. Flock even mentioned our concern about Distress Detection in an attempt to rebut our opposition to the mass surveillance their products enable.

The suspension of Distress Detection, however, does not mean that these high-powered microphones are now magically safe or beyond our concern. Acoustic gunshot detection is still a dangerous and often highly inaccurate technology that has resulted in real world harm, as in Chicago where it resulted in police shooting at children lighting fireworks. As Flock itself states, “No acoustic system is perfect, and we don't claim otherwise.” But police response to a situation where they believe guns are actively in use seems like a pretty high-stakes situation to be making, selling, and deploying technology known to be imperfect. Flock’s devices also listen for more than just gunshots. Their marketing materials admit to be listening for “community disruption,” which includes “non-violent” threats like car sideshows and fireworks. 

Flock’s failed attempt to roll out Distress Detection teaches us a few important lessons about the current state of police surveillance. First, we should not assume that just because these companies are large and well-funded, that does not ensure that they are complying with local privacy laws before floating new products to customers. Second, companies roll out and police adopt invasive technology under the justification that it will be used to address our society’s very worst crimes. However, both the companies and police will leverage deployed surveillance infrastructure to introduce new uses without necessarily seeking the consent or approval of the public. Gunshot detecting microphones eventually being used to listen for screaming is exactly the type of mission creep that we’ve seen happen with other pieces of surveillance technology, including Flock’s license plate readers. Finally, gun violence is too serious and complex of an issue to purport to solve with one flawed piece of technology. It has become too easy for police and cities to listen to the fancy marketing pitches of tech companies claiming they’re going to solve all crime instead of doing the hard work of addressing the root causes of societal issues. And, in the meantime, that technology creates more problems and hazards for the communities they blanket in police surveillance. 

As we’ve also seen with people across the country pushing back on Flock license plate reader contracts in their communities, public pressure can sometimes work to influence both companies and lawmakers that control a city’s purse strings to discontinue or divest from harmful products. Flock’s decision to end “Distress Detection” for human voices is a win.  

This month, we celebrate 36 years of EFF and a mission that is bigger than any one of us. Thanks to EFF, communities around the world are demanding that technology protects their freedom, advances justice, and opens doors to opportunity. That's not a small thing—it's a life's work worth continuing.

If you are committed to staying on the cutting edge of digital rights issues, I'd like to invite you to consider taking that commitment one step further by joining EFF’s Lighthouse Society, our way to acknowledge and thank the community of supporters who are including EFF in their legacy plans.

Learn About the Lighthouse Society

By including EFF in your will or estate plans, you can ensure that EFF’s work and values don't just live beyond you; they thrive because of you. A legacy gift is one of the most powerful ways to say: This matters, and I want it to matter long after I'm gone.

Your gift will fuel our mission for generations by protecting freedom, advancing justice, and driving innovation for communities who need it most. There is still so much more to do, so much more to fight for. With your foresight, it can go so much further.

Planned giving is also more flexible than you might realize. A bequest in your will, a simple beneficiary designation, or another estate planning option can all make a profound difference, often without affecting your finances today.

Get in touch and learn more about what's possible with the Lighthouse Society. Reach out to Jocelyn Wicker at majorgifts@eff.org or fill out our online form to share your intention to give. Thank you for considering a legacy that will carry this work forward for years to come.

When Ubisoft's Watch Dogs 2 was released in 2016, it was a headtrip for those of us working on digital-rights issues in the Bay Area. During the day, I'd fight tech-authoritarianism from EFF's San Francisco offices and then, at night, I'd fight tech-authoritarianism in an uncanny simulation of San Francisco from my home gaming console.  

Watch Dogs 2 is an open-world video game that follows a hacktivist collective called Dedsec as they take on surveillance tech and discriminatory AI systems that are being controlled by tech bros, government contractors, and corrupt cops. The game's missions often felt like they were ripped from the pages of EFF's Deeplinks blog.  

EFF’s mission is defending civil liberties in the digital world, and we do that with activists, technologists, and lawyers. If you've ever dreamt of joining Dedsec, you should definitely join us as a member.  

 Join the movement to Take Back CTRL.  

In fact, we've even got the same merch aesthetic. I cosplayed as the lead character, Marcus, at Dragon Con, and no one even knew I was in costume. 

Dave (left) as Marcus takes a selfie with a Wrench cosplayer at Dragon Con 2018.

To commemorate Watch Dog 2's 10th anniversary, I'll be speaking on a panel at San Diego Comic-Con reflecting on how the game predicted tech issues we're facing today. Organized by Mia Ginae of The Mighty Hostess and Black in Gaming, we've got voice actors Ruffin Prentiss lll and Shawn Baichoo, cinematic producer Timmy Fisher, and music producer Hudson Mohawke, who did the soundtrack, with Mia Ginae moderating. That's at 3:15 PM on Friday, July 24 in room 6BCF. 

But not everyone can get to Comic-Con and I certainly have more to say that can fit in. So here are a few ways where Watch Dogs 2 mirrored our work back then and foresaw what we're facing today.

Check out our full San Diego Comic Schedule, including panels and a meet-up. 

Insecure Surveillance Cameras 

One of the signature gameplay elements of the Watch Dogs series is the ability for your character to hack into nearby security cameras from your phone and use that to gain a strategic advantage over hostile adversaries. 

About a year before, that's exactly the issue that we were working on. EFF Technologist Cooper Quintin and I used the service Shodan to identify a slew of automated license plate readers (ALPRs) that Louisiana police had left unprotected on the internet. We found that the controls were open to anyone to manipulate and, just like in the game, you could watch the live video feeds.

We didn't use the data to acquire a skill point or collectible outfit. Instead, we forced police agencies to lock down their equipment and then used what we learned to persuade then Gov. Bobby Jindal to veto a bill that would have created a new statewide surveillance dragnet.  

This issue still persists today. Most recently, security researchers Benn Jordan and Jon “GainSec” Gaines, and the award-winning journalists at 404 Media, uncovered how at least 60 pan-tilt-zoom cameras from the vendor Flock Safety were left exposed online.

Cell-Site Simulators 

In Watch Dogs 2 there's a mission called "Stolen Signals," in which Marcus and his best friend Wrench are trying to locate "stingrays," police devices that gather nearby cell-phone data by masquerading as legit cellular towers. We call these "cell-site simulators" (CSSs) and they're are an extremely alarming mass surveillance technology that allows police to track individual users through their phone identifiers. We've long advocated that this should require a search warrant.   

Like Dedsec, we also had initiated a project to do the exact same thing. And in true Dedsec fashion, we also gave it a pop-culture name: Crocodile Hunter, an homage to wildlife expert Steve Irwin, who had famously died after a stingray attack.  

But while Marcus was running around Telegraph Hill, staff technologist Cooper Quintin and I were running around downtown San Francisco, testing out our own device for detecting suspicious cell phone towers during Salesforce's annual Dreamforce conference. And while we didn't find a CSS that day, we did find a mobile surveillance tower that a start-up had set up for the event.

Cooper Quintin, EFF's own 'Wrench,' testing out Crocodile Hunter at Dreamforce

Today, that project has evolved into Rayhunter, which allows anyone to use a cheap mobile hotspot to detect the type of cellular anomalies associated with CSSs. We're proud to say that now there's a whole international Dedsec-style network of researchers using this technology to look for surveillance at protests, at the border, and in metropolitan areas.  

Security Robots 

Throughout the game, Marcus encounters a number of autonomous pickle-shaped security robots wandering the city. At one point, Wrench reprograms one to become "Wrench Jr," a bona fide member of the Dedsec team.  

In real life, these robots are made by a company called Knightscope, and EFF started shining light on them in 2020-2021, when they were first being deployed by companies and government agencies.

A Knightscope robot patrols a casino parking lot in Reno, Nevada.

Today, law enforcement is pursuing weaponized robots and drones, and EFF is at the forefront to stop this dystopian reality. In fact, in December 2022, we successfully fought for San Francisco to ban the police department from weaponizing drones. In 2024, New York Police Department also retired its subway robot.

A Citywide Surveillance "Operating System" 

In the Watch Dog series, one of the ominous developments is CTOS 2.0 (Central Operating System 2.0). Through this system, Blume, a government contractor, tries to collect a massive amount of data through citywide sensors and infrastructure, and to combine all that data into one unified—and totally insecure—analytics system.  

At the time we'd only just begun to see this idea floated, with a limited number of cities trying tools like Palantir's Gotham to manage data.  

Today, it is a frighteningly competitive market, particularly when it comes to law enforcement surveillance. For example, both Axon and Flock Safety are trying to offer products that integrate with every function of policing that sound like CTOs. In fact, Flock Safety product is literally titled, "Flock OS."

Fusus demonstrated at a police chief's conference.

Meanwhile, Axon's camera networking product, "Fusus," sounds like it came straight from the Watch Dogs' writers room. Fusus allows for central live-streaming of all types of surveillance cameras in a city, including body-worn cameras, which was another prediction from the Watch Dog series that came true.  

EFF has been part of many local battles to reject Flock and Axon surveillance systems, and we've also advocated against recent efforts at the federal level to consolidate government data.  

Join the Fight Against Authoritarian Tech 

Watch Dogs 2's protagonists aren't just the merry band of core hackers: It's a distributed movement spread across the region and social media. The sequel, Watch Dogs Legion, is even designed so that every single person in the city of London is a potential playable Dedsec member, ready to take on tech tyranny with whatever skills they have.  

That's also our philosophy: If you use tech, if you're affected by tech, this is your fight. And it's time to take back control. 

There are a lot of ways to do this. You can become a member by donating. You can contact public officials through our Action Center. You can join the thousands of volunteers who are helping gather data on surveillance through our Atlas of Surveillance project. You can also hunt cell-site simulators with us—and help improve our code—through the Rayhunter project.  

And just like Watch Dogs 2, this is a game we can win if we work together.

EFF and ARTICLE 19 have submitted joint comments to the European Commission on draft guidelines for the Digital Services Act’s trusted flagger mechanism. Having long advocated for a DSA that protects freedom of expression while preserving intermediary liability protections and the prohibition on general monitoring, we welcome the Commission's effort to provide practical guidance on how the trusted flagger system should operate. 

The DSA’s trusted flagger system can help platforms identify illegal content more efficiently. But if implemented poorly, it could also encourage over-removal of lawful speech, weaken due process, and give government authorities disproportionate influence over online expression. 

We support the Commission's focus on good practices and illustrative examples, rather than legal interpretations that could inadvertently steer platforms toward particular enforcement outcomes—and argue that the guidelines should include stronger safeguards to protect freedom of expression, due process, and the impartiality of the trusted flagger system. 

We also support the Commission's clarification that the DSA itself does not define "illegal content"; that determination must come from applicable national or EU law. Trusted flaggers submit prioritized notice, but platforms remain responsible for determining whether content is actually illegal. Platforms must therefore conduct careful, informed assessments and should not assume that a trusted flagger notice necessarily warrants restricting content. 

Our submission highlights several areas where the guidelines could be strengthened: 

• Cross-border assessments require caution. Platforms should not rely on a trusted flagger notice to assess legality across Member States, where national legal frameworks may differ. 

• Systemic risks extend beyond content moderation. The DSA's systemic risk framework should not rely too heavily on individual moderation decisions, but should also consider broader platform design choices, including recommender systems. 

• Law enforcement authorities should generally not be granted trusted flagger status. They already have statutory powers under Article 9 of the DSA, and combining those powers with trusted flagger status creates a risk that platforms may treat trusted flagger notices as de facto removal orders, undermining due process and the rule of law. 

• Civil society organizations play an essential role. Civil society organizations help identify illegal content and report human rights abuses, but the guidelines should also recognize that these organizations may face retaliation for their work and should be protected from abusive campaigns that threaten their independence. 

• Trusted flaggers should complement—not replace—existing partnerships. The new mechanism should not sideline existing trusted partnership programs, including collaborations with civil society organizations that do not or cannot hold trusted flagger status, especially those outside of the EU with valuable regional expertise.  
  

Read the full submission here:

The California legislature has stepped back from a plan that would have expanded its age-gating law, removing language that could have compounded serious threats to users’ speech, privacy and security just to browse the internet. A.B. 1856, authored by Assemblymember Buffy Wicks, will now move forward through the legislature without its most problematic pieces.

EFF still believes the underlying law that A.B. 1856 amends, A.B. 1043, is unconstitutional. Signed into law in 2025 (and effective January of 2027), A.B. 1043 requires all operating systems and app stores to collect users’ ages, place them in various age brackets and then block young people from lawful speech and services depending on their age. We also believe that even though A.B. 1043 does not require age verification, the liability it creates for operating systems and app stores—including fining operating systems up to $7,500 per affected child for violating the law—will push those services to verify users’ ages. In practice, that could lead to more ID checks, more biometric scanning, more invasive data collection and risk of breach, and more barriers to adults’ and young people’s lawful speech.

However, we appreciate that the Legislature has abandoned its plan to expand this problematic age-gating  framework to browsers and websites. This would have significantly expanded this dangerous law before it even took effect. We thank the author and committee staff for recognizing these harms and not moving forward with this language. 

On top of that, EFF is pleased that an earlier amendment to A.B 1856 reduced the threat to the open-source community by exempting open-source operating systems. Given these changes, EFF has removed its opposition to A.B. 1856. We appreciate the author for listening to concerns from advocates, developers and others about the effect it would have on open-source development and also around expanding this problematic framework.

To be clear, we still believe the law passed last year threatens online anonymity, privacy, and security. A.B. 1043 is one of a troubling wave of proposals that encourage—or, in some cases, outright require—age verification. Our position on this is clear: no one should have to provide or verify their age to access the internet. Once users’ personal data is collected, it can easily be leaked, hacked, or misused. No matter the method, every age verification system demands that people hand over their sensitive and immutable personal information to link their offline identity to their online activity. That’s a bad deal for us all.

Age-gating mandates are reshaping the internet in ways that are invasive, dangerous, and deeply unnecessary. But users are not powerless! We can challenge these laws, protect our digital rights, and build a safer digital world for all internet users, no matter their ages. This resource hub can help—so explore, share, and join us in the fight for a better internet.

Oura Rings, Garmin GPS fitness watches, Apple Watches, Whoop bands—every year, more and more tech devices are promising to monitor our health and fitness, guide us toward healthier living, and provide useful health metrics to take to our doctors. But few of these tools provide the sorts of privacy and security promises we demand from all technology, let alone tech that captures personal health data. It’s time they step up and start providing transparency reports and stronger encryption options.

Surveys suggest that around 40 percent of people in the United States own some sort of commercially available wearable health device. Despite being marketed as health devices, they have no special health-related privacy protections that one might hope for. The companies who make these devices can and do collect an abundance of data, and many of them share that data with third-parties for marketing or to influence insurance rates, or use it for their own purposes, like training artificial intelligence models.

Health data is increasingly an important part of law enforcement or government investigations. Wearable data has been critical in a number of cases, where information about heart rate and steps was used to determine the whereabouts of individuals. And the surveillance company Penlink calls fitness trackers and wearables an “overlooked source” for law enforcement since they tend to show movement patterns and changes in heart rates. Law enforcement can try to get access to this data through subpoenas or warrants. 

There are many potential privacy issues with these sorts of devices, including whether the companies who make them share or sell information to third-parties. But here we are choosing to focus on two facets we’re concerned with around health data itself: 1) whether the company shares information with law enforcement and governments and 2) if they offer end-to-end encryption, which means the company itself can’t access that health data to begin with.

Reading through dozens of product review sites we narrowed our research in on ten companies that seem to make the majority of recommended consumer health products on the market:

• Amazfit
• Apple
• Coros
• Garmin
• Google (including Fitbit)
• Hume
• Oura
• Polar
• Suunto
• Whoop 

We reviewed each company’s public facing policies, then emailed them to confirm those findings. Here’s what we found.

Transparency Reports Are Few and Far Between

Companies should provide transparency reports of how often they provide data to the government, including information about whether it’s an official demand or an unofficial request. We have been calling on tech companies to publish transparency reports for a long time, but the practice is still rare across the industry. That’s especially true with fitness gadgets. 

Only two of the companies we surveyed, Apple and Google (which also owns Fitbit), currently publish transparency reports. Apple, Google, and Whoop promise to notify users of law enforcement requests in publicly available documentation. 

Oura now does too, after an update to their privacy policy in June 2026 that was perhaps prompted by a series of requests from journalist Zack Whittaker. In that same update and in an email to us, Oura promises that it is “actively evaluating ways to provide greater visibility into how we handle these requests, like through a transparency report.” This is promising, and we hope the company agrees that transparency reports are the best option moving forward. 

Any company that handles data that’s of interest to law enforcement and governments owes it to their users to publish transparency reports and, when legally possible, notify users when that data is requested.

Similarly, Suunto does not currently publish transparency reports, but in an email reply to our questions the company did express an openness to potentially doing so, stating, “We continuously evaluate our transparency practices and may publish additional information, such as a transparency report, in the future if we believe it would provide meaningful value for users and support our data protection efforts.” We hope they do, as these sorts of reports are a useful metric for all of us to better understand if and when our data can potentially be accessed by law enforcement.

We could not find instances where the other companies publicly state a policy around notification or transparency reports, and no others replied to our email questions.

Any company that handles data that’s of interest to law enforcement and governments owes it to their users to publish transparency reports and, when legally possible, notify users when that data is requested. This is especially true of personal health data, which can reveal our movements, and be used to infer details about what we’re doing at any given moment.

End-to-End Encrypted Data Is Far Too Rare of a Feature

End-to-end encryption is a method to ensure that your personal data is only accessible by you, and not the company who makes the device and manages the cloud storage. End-to-end encryption is usually used to refer to message encryption in communication apps, like Signal or WhatsApp, but can also refer to data storage. For example, many password managers use end-to-end encryption, and Ring implemented it for its cameras after we pushed for it. There’s no reason it can’t be offered for wearables too.

In the case of health data from wearable devices, it’s a way to store data in the cloud so that information can be synced and backed up between your device and an app on your phone in a way where only your devices can access it. 

Support for end-to-end encryption is more rare than transparency reports. 

The Apple Watch, at least with data that’s stored in the Health app, is the only popular fitness wearable that supports end-to-end encryption, and it’s enabled by default for all users (you are required to have two-factor authentication enabled as well, but that is also on by default for most accounts).

However, Apple Watch owners should remember that this protection is only for data stored in the Apple Health app. If you use other apps on your watch, or choose to share data with third-parties, like Strava, or if you’re sharing data with other wearables, like an Oura ring, that data is likely not end-to-end encrypted by the third-party company. 

Support for end-to-end encryption is more rare than transparency reports. 

And that’s it. Apple is the only one. No other popular consumer health wearable offers end-to-end encryption for the data it collects and stores online. Not Google. Not Garmin. Not Oura. Most of these companies instead offer encryption in transit and at rest, but this means those companies can still see and use your data. This is the industry standard, but it doesn’t have to be.

Another option would be more robust local-storage options. Some devices we looked at, like a handful of Garmin and Polar watches, can operate on the watch itself without syncing data to the cloud, but some models are limited in capability and cannot sync to an app without storing data online. More robust options for limiting the data to just the wearable and the phone app it's synced to would be a privacy improvement. For example, the Apple Watch has the option to disable iCloud sharing in Apple Health, which will keep the data only on your phone. It’s the only wearable we found that offers this feature without using a third-party app like Gadgetbridge or by physically connecting the wearable to a computer with a USB cable and transferring activity files over manually.

The general lack of local-only options or end-to-end encryption is a major privacy oversight, especially when you consider these devices collect heart rate, track sleep, and can log your location while also calculating a variety of health metrics supposedly intuiting everything from anxiety to your fitness “age.”

We understand that it’s technically more difficult to implement end-to-end encryption than other sorts of cloud storage, and comes with some limitations that may affect a user’s experience with a product. It also makes certain types of AI-related features harder to implement, since they’d typically need to work on-device (either in the app or the wearable device itself). Because of that, we believe an option for end-to-end encryption or local-only storage of the data collected by a wearable is the least companies can do. This way, those who want to use these devices can do so with the choice to either accept some privacy risks, or choose a more locked down option.

What’s Next

If you’re a user of a fitness wearable from any of the companies we’ve reached out to, or any other one, don’t be shy in asking for these sorts of features. In the rare cases a company offers a feature request page, use it—like for Garmin, Polar, Suunto, and Whoop. And when those types of outlets aren’t offered, don’t shy away from general contact pages, like those offered by Amazfit and Oura, or on community subreddits.

The companies that make these wearables, whether they’re designed for fitness or health, need to improve. At the bare minimum, companies need to publish transparency reports detailing how often they receive requests from law enforcement and commit to notifying users whenever that happens. 

It’s also well past the time for more companies to offer end-to-end encryption for the health data they’re storing. We acknowledge that this may be a trade-off for some features, like social networking features, but it should be up to users to decide if they’re willing to make those trade-offs. This level of privacy is an appealing feature that benefits users in myriad ways and more companies can set themselves apart by committing to this level of privacy.

Health data is some of the most personal data we produce, and most wearables companies are behind the times when it comes to basic privacy practices and transparency. Now’s the time to improve those practices.

The effort to age gate the internet is back in Washington—and now it has a new name. Recently passed by the House of Representatives, the KIDS Act is a sprawling package of proposals to control what we can see and say online. Supporters claim the KIDS Act is needed to protect minors online. But if lawmakers really want to make the internet safer, why are they encouraging more surveillance instead of protecting our privacy? We dive into this question with our EFFector newsletter.

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For over 35 years, EFFector has been your guide to understanding the intersection of technology, civil liberties, and the law. This issue covers a victory for location privacy in the Supreme Court, disturbing developments in the militarization of domestic drones, and a controversial Congressional bill to control what we can see and say online.

Prefer to listen in? EFFector is now available on all major podcast platforms. This time, we're chatting with EFF Senior Policy Analyst Joe Mullin on what would happen to the open internet if the KIDS Act becomes law. You can find the episode and subscribe on your podcast platform of choice:

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One of the best bulwarks against monopoly is interoperability—that is making a new product or service work with an existing product or service. Interoperability allows users, and not the manufacturers of their devices or largest player in a market, to decide what application best serves them. Unsurprisingly, companies like Apple have worked hard to resist interoperability requirements. 

On July 8, the General Court of the  European Union (General Court) ruled against Apple in several cases the company brought against the European Commission (joint cases), affirming the company’s obligations under the Digital Markets Act (DMA). Apple argued in the cases that it should be exempted from the law’s requirements especially with regards to interoperability on multiple grounds. We applaud the General Court’s  decision, and congratulate the Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) as well as others who intervened in support of the Commission against Apple's attempt to shirk off its responsibilities, thus ensuring fair competition in European markets.

A Positive Development for Europeans

This is a clear and substantive win for developers and users in Europe. The stranglehold Apple exerts over its ‘walled garden’ is injurious for developers, users, and researchers alike. By confirming Apple’s obligations under the DMA, the General Court has ensured that developers will be given more choice on where they can publish their apps, and users will have more options to obtain apps which, for whatever reason, Apple dislikes. And researchers will have less roadblocks and hurdles to overcome in their studies of Apple’s OSes, particularly iOS, iPadOS, and watchOS.

Apple argues that the interoperability requirements will force it to lower the security standards that have led Apple products’ users to trust their devices. While this self-serving logic is not entirely without merit, it is far from the inevitable outcome. Especially with regards to the App Store, users can be given clear, informed choice when leaving the Apple ecosystem to obtain apps elsewhere. While we urge European courts to take Apple’s security concerns seriously, we’ve previously noted that this should not be used as a smokescreen to protect anticompetitive behavior.

Interoperability and security are not inherently at odds. When interoperable functionality is worked into the security model of a platform from the ground-up, a proper balance can be struck between two forces that are often falsely framed as naturally conflicting. While Apple OS platforms have not been built this way from the get-go, it is still possible, but takes more time to get it right. Here, the devil is in the implementation details.

Apple’s Case Arguments and the Court’s Rebuttal

Under the DMA, designation as a ‘gatekeeper’ is reserved for the biggest of Big Tech, companies that provide services deemed essential for businesses to reach end users. Apple is one of only seven companies that meet this designation, along with Alphabet, Amazon, Booking, ByteDance, Meta, and Microsoft. In its case, Apple argued that Article 6(7) of the DMA, specifying interoperability requirements for gatekeepers aimed at restoring fair competition, is unlawful in light of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union (specifically the right to property), and as such its designation as a gatekeeper subject to the requirements is unlawful and should be annulled as a result. In its ruling, the General Court rejected the argument as Article 6(7) does not form the legal basis of the designation.

Apple separately argues that the App Store fails to meet the requirements defining a core platform service (CPS), since the various stores (across iOS, iPadOS, watchOS, macOS) do not constitute a single platform. A company’s gatekeeper status relies on it providing a CPS that is an important gateway for business users to reach end users. Here, the implications of the argument are clear: remove service designation as CPSes, remove the gatekeeper status. The court rejected the argument on the basis that “irrespective of the device on which it was available, each of the App Stores was used for the same purpose, namely to intermediate between end users and business users in the distribution of applications and in-app digital content.”

Finally, the court rejected as inadmissible Apple’s argument that iMessage should not be classified as a number-independent interpersonal communication service (NIICS) constituting a CPS. This decision rested on the fact that the “classification does not, by itself, produce binding legal effects that bring about a change in Apple’s legal position” since iMessage was not listed as an “important gateway” in the designation decision and therefore was not subject to the DMA obligations.

In ruling against Apple in favor of the European Commission, the General Court has set an important precedent in ensuring competitive fairness and openness in the digital marketplace. The landmark effects of the DMA will serve to benefit all Europeans in the choice and freedom it affords them. Despite Big Tech’s legal challenges, these decisions build a strong foundation for a better digital future—a lesson which other regions should learn from and take note.

This year the state of New York had the dubious honor of being the first to pass a controversial provision to mandate all 3D printers come with surveillance and censorship. That means not only is there a ticking clock to protect every artist, researcher, engineer, and hobbyist in the state, but there is a real risk of other states thoughtlessly following suit—prior to the New York rules even taking effect.

We, along with many other experts, already warned about this bill buried in the state’s crowded budget process. Hundreds of our supporters and 3D printing enthusiasts in New York reached out to their representatives hoping to kill this farcical bill. While there were some welcome amendments in response to the outcry, Albany passed it anyway.

It might be well-intentioned, but bills like these sell a fantasy that can only have an untold negative impact on the privacy, free expression, and consumer rights of anyone using these general purpose devices. Behind the banner of reducing gun violence, which is nearly always committed with commercial firearms, New York lawmakers have passed draconian legislation that will let manufacturers lock in users and collect their data.

Now that the bill has passed and been signed by Governor Hochul, let’s look at two important ways the final legislation changed since we last wrote about it, and why states like California shouldn’t make the same mistake.

Reduced Risk for Lawful File Sharing 

The New York bill includes language that criminalizes access to firearm print files, a proposal correctly dropped by states like Colorado due to First Amendment concerns. While this made it through to the passed legislation, a few wins were still gained.

Originally the legislation threatened felony charges for the storing and sharing of files, potentially impacting researchers, artists, and journalists with no intention of printing a firearm component. These charges were downgraded to a Class A misdemeanor.

Two provisions criminalized file sharing. The first of the two provisions criminalizing this file sharing, which pertains to the sale or distribution of files in the state, gained an important exception for when a sender has a reasonable belief that the recipient won’t illegally print these components. However the second provision, pertaining to criminalizing file possession, complicates this. Under 2.12 of the subpart, people who possess the file with intent to share the files do not clearly get this same reasonable belief exception.

In other words, if you share one of these files the actual sharing is covered by the exception, but the law makes it ambiguous whether possessing those same files is covered when you intend to share them.

While this exception could have created some breathing room for researchers and journalists operating in good faith, this slapdash bill language leaves plenty of ambiguity and potential speech-chilling effects. However, these changes do offer a modicum of harm reduction in this unconstitutional law.

Saving Face by Preserving Online Sale

Originally the bill had a strange requirement for all 3D printers and Computer Numerical Control, or CNC, machines to be sold and delivered face-to-face, with no exception. That would have meant a major barrier to access, particularly for people in agricultural and rural areas of the state who uniquely benefit from in-home fabrication and repair. It also would have meant a major inconvenience for businesses using these devices. For everyone though, it meant fewer retailers to choose from and facing more stigma for using these devices. 

Fortunately this was dropped from the bill entirely. 

Next Step: We Find Out What Was Actually Passed

In addition to being buried in the complicated legislative process of the NY budget and avoiding proper scrutiny, this bill also kicked the can down the road in determining what exactly is being mandated. In many respects, legislators passed a vibe. We’ll see how the actual law be developed over the next year by a working group with no mandated transparency to the public. Further, they have no obligation to ensure consumer safeguards in developing this state-mandated censorware.

We are still concerned by the possibility of a biased working group acting in the interest of manufacturers or facing pressure to accept consumer harms in the standards they produce. Our remaining hope is this working group convened by the Department of State and the state university system is composed of actual experts who are aware of how unfeasible and harmful this mandate is, and prevent it from being realized.

The Fight Continues

New York is the first to go down this path of state-mandated censorship and surveillance software on 3D printers, but it’s far from the only one to entertain it. It is now more urgent that we fiercely oppose this trend in other states, like California,  as they attempt to join the bandwagon—before even seeing the real-world impacts. 

Take action

Don’t Let California Repeat NY’s Mistake

We cannot allow this to be the foundation for future restrictions on speech and design, or serve as a playbook for the state and corporations to wrest control over our tools.

Legal intern Suzanne Castillo co-authored this post.

Playstation’s decision to kill physical game discs is the latest attack on our diminishing rights to access and engage with culture digitally. Rent-seeking corporations and negligent lawmakers share the blame–and they can do better. 

We’ve seen the same playbook used in the move to digital distribution of  film, TV, and music: draw in customers with the convenience of a digital download, then limit physical access and move the goalpost on what it actually means to “own” a piece of media. The end goal is to turn the customer into a renter, stuck making regular subscription payments for access. Gamers are right to sound the alarm, and we must take this moment to fight for digital ownership before it’s too late.

Disk Space Invaders

Depriving gamers of physical discs leads to another obvious and immediate cost: data.  Unlike other digital media like film and TV, video games require a ton of storage. Access to high speed internet is still abysmal in the US, making the high-speeds needed for digital game downloads a luxury some of us may take for granted. For many, a modern game can take days and exceed their data caps. 

This made physical discs, particularly for the biggest AAA titles, a logical choice that also largely spared gamers from losing traditional ownership rights. With physical disks, the cost of storing the game was included in the purchase.

Own or Be Pwned

Limiting customers to digital copies also pushes gamers further into rent-only copyright culture.

Physical media comes with a "right of first sale," which means you can lawfully share, resell, alter, or destroy your own copy of a copyrighted work. This right has also helped protect the emergence of alternative community servers, and emulator addition of online play to games from the dial up era.

But courts have held that digital media doesn't carry the same right, meaning no such protection is afforded to digital purchases. Your ability to freely share games with friends or pass them on to family members becomes totally subject to the whims of the distributor. 

So, for example, a digital-only approach effectively guts the second-hand market for games. Saving some money with a used game and recouping the costs by reselling are no longer an option. Even with steep discounts and holiday sales, this raises the minimum cost of engaging with the medium at all.

The inevitable conclusion of the move to digital-only purchases is to lock gamers into  subscription models, making their access totally dependent on the distributor— or, several distributors, as we’ve seen with major TV and movie streamers. A handful of companies actually own the games, and your only option is to regularly pay for fractured libraries of games you may never play and will never truly own.

Achievement Locked

Since digital games are easy to copy, distributors and publishers argue that they are in an arms race against piracy. The irony is that law-abiding customers consistently suffer collateral damage. 

Most digital distributors lock down the content they offer with restrictive user agreements and digital rights management (DRM) software. DRM software, in particular, imposes onerous controls on the game — like forcing internet connection for single player games or modifications that harm performance — and can even introduce serious privacy and security concerns. Any gamer or researcher in the US who wants to reduce this burden by removing or modifying that DRM risks a lawsuit, thanks to Section 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). This federal law makes it illegal to alter DRM software, and is a beloved tool for companies trying to restrict how we can lawfully use our purchases — whether it’s a copy of the newest tractor simulator or a literal tractor. 

And since much of this DRM is tied to user accounts, ownership of a game is also revocable and modifiable for any number of reasons outside of your control. Error in your subscription payment? Your account got hacked? Licensing deal falls through with a major publisher? Developers want to kill the game in an update? All of this can limit or change your ability to access the game long after your so-called “purchase.”

Level-up Ownership

Policymakers can and should work to restore our ownership rights for the digital age. 

That starts with legal protections ensuring that the same rights that apply to physical media apply to digital media. Next up? Reform Section 1201 of the DMCA to clarify that it does not forbid fair uses.  

At the state level, we need meaningful consumer protections. Some promising models include California’s AB 1921, which would clarify what customers are actually paying for on digital storefronts and ensure some protections for maintaining discontinued games. The gaming industry has done its best to kill the bill, including claiming that private community servers are illegal. 

If you bought it, you should own it, and EFF will continue working to mitigate some of the worst harms of the DMCA 1201, defending modders, and fighting deceptive licensing that makes culture less free.