Still Flawed and Lacking Safeguards, UN Cybercrime Treaty Goes Before the UN General Assembly, then States for Adoption

Most UN Member States, including the U.S., are expected to support adoption of the flawed UN Cybercrime Treaty when it’s scheduled to go before the UN General Assembly this week for a vote, despite warnings that it poses dangerous risks to human...

Calls to Scrap Jordan's Cybercrime Law Echo Calls to Reject Cybercrime Treaty

In a number of countries around the world, communities—and particularly those that are already vulnerable—are threatened by expansive cybercrime and surveillance legislation. One of those countries is Jordan, where a cybercrime law enacted in 2023...

Broad Scope Will Authorize Cross-Border Spying for Acts of Expression: Why You Should Oppose Draft UN Cybercrime Treaty

The draft UN Cybercrime Convention was supposed to help tackle serious online threats like ransomware attacks, which cost billions of dollars in damages every year.But, after two and a half years of negotiations among UN Member States, the draft...

Security Researchers and Journalists at Risk: Why You Should Hate the Proposed UN Cybercrime Treaty

The proposed UN Cybercrime Treaty puts security researchers and journalists at risk of being criminally prosecuted for their work identifying and reporting computer system vulnerabilities, work that keeps the digital ecosystem safer for...

Calls Mount—from Principal UN Human Rights Official, Business, and Tech Groups—To Address Dangerous Flaws in Draft UN Surveillance Treaty

As UN delegates sat down in New York this week to restart negotiations, calls are mounting from all corners—from the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) to Big Tech—to add critical human rights protections to, and fix other...

Weak Human Rights Protections: Why You Should Hate the Proposed UN Cybercrime Treaty

The proposed UN Cybercrime Convention dangerously undermines human rights, opening the door to unchecked cross-border surveillance and government overreach. Despite two and a half years of negotiations, the draft treaty authorizes extensive...

Why You Should Hate the Proposed UN Cybercrime Treaty

International UN treaties aren’t usually on users’ radar. They are debated, often over the course of many years, by diplomats and government functionaries in Vienna or New York, and their significance is often overlooked or lost in the flood of...

Briefing: Negotiating States Must Address Human Rights Risks in the Proposed UN Surveillance Treaty

At a virtual briefing today, experts from the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), Access Now, Derechos Digitales, Human Rights Watch, and the International Fund for Public Interest Media outlined the human rights risks posed by the proposed UN...

EFF, International Partners Appeal to EU Delegates to Help Fix Flaws in Draft UN Cybercrime Treaty That Can Undermine EU's Data Protection Framework

With the final negotiating session to approve the UN Cybercrime Treaty just days away, EFF and 21 international civil society organizations today urgently called on delegates from EU states and the European Commission to push back on the draft...

UN Cybercrime Draft Convention Dangerously Expands State Surveillance Powers Without Robust Privacy and Data Protection Safeguards

This is the third post in a series highlighting flaws in the proposed UN Cybercrime Convention. Check out Part I, our detailed analysis on the criminalization of security research activities, and Part II, an analysis of the human rights...

UN Cybercrime Draft Convention Dangerously Expands State Surveillance Powers Without Robust Privacy and Data Protection Safeguards

This is the third post in a series highlighting flaws in the proposed UN Cybercrime Convention. Check out Part I, our detailed analysis on the criminalization of security research activities, and Part II, an analysis of the human rights...

The UN Cybercrime Draft Convention is a Blank Check for Unchecked Surveillance Abuses

This is the first post in a series highlighting the problems and flaws in the proposed UN Cybercrime Convention. Check out our detailed analysis on the criminalization of security research activities under the proposed convention.The United...

If Not Amended, States Must Reject the Flawed Draft UN Cybercrime Convention Criminalizing Security Research and Certain Journalism Activities

The latest and nearly final version of the proposed UN Cybercrime Convention—dated May 23, 2024 but released today June 14—leaves security researchers’ and investigative journalists’ rights perilously unprotected, despite EFF’s repeated...

NETMundial+10 Multistakeholder Statement Pushes for Greater Inclusiveness in Internet Governance Processes

A new statement about strengthening internet governance processes emerged from the NETMundial +10 meeting in Brazil last month, strongly reaffirming the value of and need for a multistakeholder approach involving full and balanced participation of...

Draft UN Cybercrime Treaty Could Make Security Research a Crime, Leading 124 Experts to Call on UN Delegates to Fix Flawed Provisions that Weaken Everyone’s Security

Security researchers’ work discovering and reporting vulnerabilities in software, firmware, networks, and devices protects people, businesses and governments around the world from malware, theft of critical data, and other cyberattacks. The...

Protect Good Faith Security Research Globally in Proposed UN Cybercrime Treaty

Statement to be submitted by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, accredited under operative paragraph No. 9 of UN General Assembly Resolution 75/282, on behalf of 124 signatories. We, the undersigned, representing a broad spectrum of the global...

In Final Talks on Proposed UN Cybercrime Treaty, EFF Calls on Delegates to Incorporate Protections Against Spying and Overcriminalization or Reject Convention

UN Member States are meeting in New York this week to conclude negotiations over the final text of the UN Cybercrime Treaty, which—despite warnings from hundreds of civil society organizations across the globe, security researchers, media rights...

EFF and More Than 100+ NGOS Set Non-Negotiable Redlines Ahead of UN Cybercrime Treaty Negotiations

EFF has joined forces with 110 NGOs today in a joint statement delivered to the United Nations Ad Hoc Committee, clearly outlining civil society non-negotiable redlines for the proposed UN Cybercrime Treaty, and asserting that states should reject...

UAE Confirms Trial Against 84 Detainees; Ahmed Mansoor Suspected Among Them

The UAE confirmed this week that it has placed 84 detainees on trial, on charges of “establishing another secret organization for the purpose of committing acts of violence and terrorism on state territory.” Suspected to be among those facing...

Latest Draft of UN Cybercrime Treaty Is A Big Step Backward

A new draft of the controversial United Nations cybercrime treaty has only heightened concerns that the treaty will criminalize expression and dissent, create extensive surveillance powers, and facilitate cross-border repression. The proposed...