Rebekah Bradway's blog

Blurred Boundaries: When Copyright and FOIA Collide

Technology has given citizens the ability to interact with government information in a way never before possible. Some exploit this data for commercial gain; others use new analysis techniques to uncover layers of meaning previously unrecognized; still others collate and publish government records to simplify access for everyone else. But what happens when there is an assertion that vital government records are subject to copyright restrictions?

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An Increase in Infringement or the Promotion of Censorship? The Growing Tension of VPN Use

In the days of unwarranted government surveillance and elaborate data collection, people increasingly rely on anonymizing services to keep their online activities private, such as proxy servers, encrypted cloud storage, and virtual private networks. Virtual private networks, or VPNs, route online communications through a secure and encrypted private network to a remote server (sometimes in a jurisdiction with greater protection for freedom of speech or weaker law enforcement).

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Metadata as a Public Record: What it Means, What it Does

The failure to comply with a records request for email metadata will cost a Washington city more than half a million dollars in statutory and attorney's fees, a Washington Superior Court judge recently decided.

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Reputation vs. National Security: The Supreme Court Takes on an Airline Defamation Case

The Supreme Court has granted certiorari to the first defamation case it's heard since 1990, and in it, the Court will be balancing injury to reputation against -- what else? -- national security.

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Aghast at Ag-Gag Legislation: Silencing Speech for What it Reveals

Ag-gag cowWith the ubiquity of smart phones and digital communication, most of us whisk our phones out to record anything we find significant without giving it a second thought. But when one Utah woman did this in early February, she was charged as a criminal -- solely because the activities she recorded took place on agricultural land.

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