Fordham Law’s Center on Law and Information Privacy released a study that found state educational databases across the country ignore key privacy protections for the nation’s K – 12 children. The findings come as Congress is considering legislation that would expand and integrate the 43 existing state databases without taking into account the critical privacy…
Category: U.S.
Maine ruling due on privacy of anti-gay-marriage donors
David Hench reports: A federal judge will rule Wednesday on whether the state may require two national organizations that are working to repeal Maine’s gay-marriage law to disclose their contributors. The National Organization for Marriage and American Principles in Action have challenged the state campaign finance laws that apply to ballot question committees, arguing that…
Court case shows (yet again) limits of anonymous blogging
Jacqui Cheng reports: US courts have historically looked on anonymous bloggers and commenters with a sympathetic eye, but there are exceptions. A Tennessee judge denied a blogger’s motion to quash a subpoena to reveal his identity last week, and he also denied a motion to dismiss the case. With few other options available to him…
Privacy, free speech, and the PATRIOT Act: First and Fourth Amendment limits on national security letters
Patrick P. Garlinger has a Note in the October issue of the New York University Law Review. The abstract is: Congress’s passage of the Patriot Act after 9/11 expanded the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) information-gathering authority to issue national security letters (NSL). Without any judicial review, the FBI issues NSLs to telecommunications providers to…