Checkout the 2025 recipients of the @eff.org awards - @justfutureslaw.bsky.social , @erie.bsky.social , and Software Freedom Law Center India. The full event is posted on YouTube and the Internet Archive, and a transcript of the live captions is also available.

Face coverings are now banned for most law enforcement in California. Credit to the activists and organizers in California who spoke up, organized, and added pressure! www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

ICE records on Palantir show how the company has long been enmeshed in the day-to-day operations fueling ICE surveillance and deportations.

ICE is using shady, beta-testing facial recognition app, Mobile Fortify, without offering a legal basis for its usage or the databases it connects with. www.404media.co/congress-pus...

It was an honor to accept this award on behalf of colleagues at @justfutureslaw.bsky.social and our grassroots partners who partner with us on litigation, policy and research. I admire them so much. And thanks to @eff.org for a hella fun night.

Nexar, a dashcam company, takes photos of faces, license plates, and audio to sell to other companies. This is why JFL advocates that the only way to prevent our data from falling into the wrong hands is to ensure they don't have access to it in the first place

If you need a morale boost, you must watch this @eff.org award ceremony today. The acceptance speeches of the three awardees @mishi.bsky.social @erie.bsky.social and @justfutureslaw.bsky.social are so incredibly moving and inspiring.

@mishi.bsky.social accepted the 2025 EFF Award for Defending Digital Freedoms on behalf of @sflcin.bsky.social at the EFF Awards. You can hear her full speech TOMORROW at 12pm PT at EFF’s annual award ceremony livestream. Register now at eff.org/awards.

Congratulations to @justfutureslaw.bsky.social for receiving the 2025 EFF Award for Leading Immigration and Surveillance Litigation!

@ParomitaShah.bsky.social of @justfutureslaw.bsky.social accepts the EFF Award: “I applaud all of us who are throwing sands in the gears of this authoritarian legal front.”

To learn more about @justfutureslaw.bsky.social, check out our EFF Awards Spotlight: www.eff.org/deeplinks/2...

@justfutureslaw.bsky.social has also worked with @GrassrootsNews.bsky.social to demand the release of people detained under Operation Lone Star and they produce reports and toolkits that explain how people can expose and fight surveillance technologies in their own communities.

In 2019, @justfutureslaw.bsky.social was formed by 4 women of color and, since then, JFL has filed lawsuits against Western Union, LexisNexis, and Clearview AI to protect the privacy and personal data of immigrants, protesters, and communities of color.

@jenlynch.bsky.social presents EFF Award for Leading Immigration and Surveillance Litigation to @JustFuturesLaw.bsky.social: “JFL uses the law, their longstanding connections, and their unique expertise to help immigrants, activists, organizers, and community groups fight back.”

"The most powerful executives in America continue to kowtow to a president who is systematically dismantling the foundations of democracy; it may be time for another axiom: The only principle is power." www.wired.com/story/tech-c...

Let it be clear that Trump is sending soldiers and federal agents to punish Democratic-led cities and to cause panic in immigrant communities. Our communities will continue to resist and protect migrant communities regardless of what comes our way. www.nytimes.com/article/trum...

Looking forward to celebrating with EFF soon!

A thread on how the border is now a site of unfathomable persecution, and how it has been years in the making. 🧵 (1/4)

ICE officers show up and arrest firefighters as they are actively putting out fires. There are no words to describe the cruelty and the lengths ICE is willing to go to reach the Trump administration's disturbing obsession with migrants. www.washingtonpost.com/climate-envi...

CBP recently reached a record high number of intrusive phone, computer, and other device searches. “This is essentially a limitless authority that they claim for themselves to search travelers without a warrant to search the full scope of information people carry on them,” Bhandari

Trump is paying Palantir millions of dollars to create a database to access ALL personal information about EVERYONE in America. Our data can be used against us at any time; we must stop this machine before we are one search away from criminalization. www.mercurynews.com/2025/08/23/o...

DC is under occupation, and the Trump administration is sending social media teams to make fake propaganda that DC requires federal troops. Unraveling these lies will take time, effort, and care. And we must, because people are being disappeared from our neighborhoods and communities.

Let's put a spotlight on our EFF Awards winners! 🌟 @justfutureslaw.bsky.social is a women-of-color-led law project using litigation to build the power of immigrant rights and criminal justice activists and organizers. Catch them in person on Sept 10 in San Francisco! eff.org/effawards

DHS took DNA from immigrant children and stored it in a database. "The agency’s aggressive DNA collection is but one node in a broader effort to redefine policing through vast use of biometric and behavioral data." This is what massive genetic surveillance looks like.

ICE added a random person into a group chat and leaked how they pulled data from DMV and License plate readers to find their target. ICE is increasingly gaining access to more sensitive and personal information to effectuate deportations. www.404media.co/ice-adds-ran...

Cook County Sheriffs gave ICE access to data to arrest immigrants. "These platforms are essential to how ICE locates & targets individuals, especially in places where local law enforcement can’t legally cooperate.” Laura Rivera

Detention centers impact us in every single possible way, emotionally, economically & environmentally.

Judge Kathleen M. Williams of the Federal District Court in Miami found that the state and federal governments had violated a federal law that requires an environmental review for the ‘Alligator Alcatraz’ detention center. She ordered it to be shut down for now.

Clearview AI has built the most dangerous facial recognition database in the country, allowing law enforcement, government, and private companies to identify, locate, and track people—where they go, who they’re with, and what they say—at the touch of a button on a mobile device.

This is why we must keep talking about the billions of dollars the current administration is pouring into a militarized border. Our border tech factsheet shows where the money is going static1.squarespace.com/static/62c31...

Border communities foreshadow the types of surveilled realities we will ALL be subjected to. prospect.org/justice/2025...

Meta smart glasses were spotted on a CBP agent at a Los Angeles raid. Little accountability and transparency exist when it comes to the gadgets CBP can use to surveil. www.404media.co/a-cbp-agent-...

NYPD went around the city's facial recognition ban to identify a pro-Palestinian protester. The search dived into his photos when he was a teenager, including a high school dance & a school play. Police departments continue to use facial recognition in deeply disturbing ways - we must end this now.

Once your data is in the hands of  ICE and police, it's nearly impossible to get that data back. That's why it is important to keep them out of it in the first place and push back every step of the way. www.npr.org/2025/06/24/n...

"The danger inherent in Palantir’s AI-powered super-database on all Americans is connected to the vast wealth & power of those associated with the corporation, & their apparent disdain for democratic institutions." To stop Trump's deportation and surveillance dragnet, we need to block Palantir.

LA is organizing and filing a lawsuit against the Trump administration's mass ICE raids and show of violent force. We refuse to normalize mass deportations of our loved ones. www.nytimes.com/2025/07/08/u...

ICE will be handed tens of billions of dollars to continue carrying out Trump's cruel plans of mass deportations. Taxpayer money that could be used for housing, education, food security NOT deportations. Our communities deserve so much better.

Judge has thrown out the Trump admin's attempt to force Illinois & Chicago to cooperate with federal gov on immigration enforcement. Sanctuary protections are the legal and moral thing to do for our communities. The courts have the power to prevent the mass deportation machine from growing.

Yesterday we filed a class action lawsuit to preserve TPS for Haiti. The reasons behind Trump's termination are motivated by racism, not law.

ICYMI: Trump is deregulating AI development by removing environmental protections. Trump is doing exactly what the AI industry wants, putting profit over people. www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

We've been saying it all along: Alternatives to Detention were never really an alternative, they were an extension of digital cages. This is how data + surveillance come together under an anti-immigrant and authoritarian regime.

NEW: Nathan Albers once co-owned a company that schemed to hire and conceal undocumented workers. Now his company could make hundreds of millions from work on the nation's largest detention camp. “The irony is thick,” said a former DHS official.

AI this, AI that, what about how much energy AI actually uses? “It blows my mind that you can buy a car and know how many miles per gallon it consumes, yet we use all these AI tools every day and we have absolutely no efficiency metrics, emissions factors, nothing." From the experts:

CBP is looking to expand cell phone hacking capabilities for seized phones at the border. The more CBP has access to our private data, the more they will continue to bypass due process and justify their unlawful deportations www.wired.com/story/cbp-wa...

Our Fall 2025 legal internships are now open! If you are passionate about the fast-developing field of technology driven immigration enforcement & local policing, join JFL's team to get firsthand experience on legal research and projects.

“For years, the IRS has told immigrants that it only cares that they pay their taxes. By agreeing to share taxpayer data with ICE on a mass basis, the IRS has gone back on its word.” - @publiccitizen.bsky.social

We followed the money & it lead to us how Big Ugly Bill will pour billions into border & surveillance tech. Read our most recent report to learn about the kinds of tech being expanded and the companies set to benefit from this unprecedented level of spending.

If there is one thing the past and present have taught us is that organizing works. We have so much more power than we think and we can start in our neighborhoods and local neighborhoods 📢📢📢

Is it accurate to call the United States a nation of laws when our highest court will simply suspend laws disfavored by a Republican president?