Civil Liberties
1,459 Articles
The Rhetoric of “Responsible Encryption”
Last week, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein gave a speech about encryption that prompted a considerable amount of well-deserved blowback. His speech rehashed a number of…
Responsibility and the Encryption Debate: A Response to DAG Rosenstein
Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein. Last week, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein gave a speech about encryption at the U.S. Naval Academy, solidifying the Trump administration’s…
Surveillance “Reform”: The Fourth Amendment’s Long, Slow, Goodbye
Over 16 years after the 9/11 attacks and the subsequent repeated passage or renewal of draconian “temporary” but “emergency” domestic surveillance laws in response, it’s…
New Suit Filed in Virginia to Prevent Another “Charlottesville” Paramilitary Rally
Just Security readers may find of interest the lawsuit that my colleagues and I at Georgetown Law’s Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection, alongside local counsel,…
Terrorist Financing: A Backgrounder
Ed. note. This post is the latest in our series on the U.S. Supreme Court case Jesner. v. Arab Bank, a case that is slated to resolve the question of whether corporations can…
My Priorities As UN Special Rapporteur on Counter Terrorism: The Problem of Permanent Emergencies
French soldiers patrolling a street of Saint Denis, France, during an anti-terrorist raid on November 18, 2015. France has been under a government-declared state of emergency…
The Increasingly Unsettling Indifference Toward the US Citizen “Enemy Combatant”
It’s now been over three weeks since an American citizen who is being held by the United States in military detention as an “enemy combatant” after allegedly…
How US Surveillance Helps Repressive Regimes—the Ethiopia Case
Recent stories from Edward Snowden’s disclosures show how the US government’s involvement with Ethiopia presents a case study in enabling repressive regimes to carry out…
Nominations Sought: Alexander Human Rights Prize (Oct. 1 Deadline)
Santa Clara University School of Law is seeking nominations of outstanding lawyers who might be candidates for the Alexander Law Prize, given annually by the Law School. Now in…
Facebook’s Silencing of Refugees Reveals Dangers of Censorship Technologies
Countless Rohingya refugees have tried to record the ethnic cleansing of their communities by turning to Facebook, the social network that promised to give a voice to the voiceless.…
Episode 37 of the National Security Law Podcast: Enemy Combatants, Agents of Foreign Powers
In this week’s episode, Bobby Chesney and I explore three big national security law developments from the past few days. First is that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court…
We Need to Know More About Government Searches of Travelers’ Electronic Devices
Relying on directives from the George W. Bush administration, U.S. border patrol and immigration officers have been subjecting travelers crossing U.S. borders to intrusive searches…