YunoBlog

Author: tio

  • Germany Doxes “UNKN,” Head of RU Ransomware Gangs REvil, GandCrab

    Germany Doxes “UNKN,” Head of RU Ransomware Gangs REvil, GandCrab

    An elusive hacker who went by the handle “UNKN” and ran the early Russian ransomware groups GandCrab and REvil now has a name and a face. Authorities in Germany say 31-year-old Russian Daniil Maksimovich Shchukin headed both cybercrime gangs and helped carry out at least 130 acts of computer sabotage and extortion against victims across the country between 2019 and 2021.

    Shchukin was named as UNKN (a.k.a. UNKNOWN) in an advisory published by the German Federal Criminal Police (the “Bundeskriminalamt” or BKA for short). The BKA said Shchukin and another Russian — 43-year-old Anatoly Sergeevitsch Kravchuk — extorted nearly $2 million euros across two dozen cyberattacks that caused more than 35 million euros in total economic damage.

    Daniil Maksimovich SHCHUKIN, a.k.a. UNKN, and Anatoly Sergeevitsch Karvchuk, alleged leaders of the GandCrab and REvil ransomware groups.

    Germany’s BKA said Shchukin acted as the head of one of the largest worldwide operating ransomware groups GandCrab and REvil, which pioneered the practice of double extortion — charging victims once for a key needed to unlock hacked systems, and a separate payment in exchange for a promise not to publish stolen data.

    Shchukin’s name appeared in a Feb. 2023 filing (PDF) from the U.S. Justice Department seeking the seizure of various cryptocurrency accounts associated with proceeds from the REvil ransomware gang’s activities. The government said the digital wallet tied to Shchukin contained more than $317,000 in ill-gotten cryptocurrency.

    The Gandcrab ransomware affiliate program first surfaced in January 2018, and paid enterprising hackers huge shares of the profits just for hacking into user accounts at major corporations. The Gandcrab team would then try to expand that access, often siphoning vast amounts of sensitive and internal documents in the process. The malware’s curators shipped five major revisions to the GandCrab code, each corresponding with sneaky new features and bug fixes aimed at thwarting the efforts of computer security firms to stymie the spread of the malware.

    On May 31, 2019, the GandCrab team announced the group was shutting down after extorting more than $2 billion from victims. “We are a living proof that you can do evil and get off scot-free,” GandCrab’s farewell address famously quipped. “We have proved that one can make a lifetime of money in one year. We have proved that you can become number one by general admission, not in your own conceit.”

    The REvil ransomware affiliate program materialized around the same as GandCrab’s demise, fronted by a user named UNKNOWN who announced on a Russian cybercrime forum that he’d deposited $1 million in the forum’s escrow to show he meant business. By this time, many cybersecurity experts had concluded REvil was little more than a reorganization of GandCrab.

    UNKNOWN also gave an interview to Dmitry Smilyanets, a former malicious hacker hired by Recorded Future, wherein UNKNOWN described a rags-to-riches tale unencumbered by ethics and morals.

    “As a child, I scrounged through the trash heaps and smoked cigarette butts,” UNKNOWN told Recorded Future. “I walked 10 km one way to the school. I wore the same clothes for six months. In my youth, in a communal apartment, I didn’t eat for two or even three days. Now I am a millionaire.”

    As described in The Ransomware Hunting Team by Renee Dudley and Daniel Golden, UNKNOWN and REvil reinvested significant earnings into improving their success and mirroring practices of legitimate businesses. The authors wrote:

    “Just as a real-world manufacturer might hire other companies to handle logistics or web design, ransomware developers increasingly outsourced tasks beyond their purview, focusing instead on improving the quality of their ransomware. The higher quality ransomware—which, in many cases, the Hunting Team could not break—resulted in more and higher pay-outs from victims. The monumental payments enabled gangs to reinvest in their enterprises. They hired more specialists, and their success accelerated.”

    “Criminals raced to join the booming ransomware economy. Underworld ancillary service providers sprouted or pivoted from other criminal work to meet developers’ demand for customized support. Partnering with gangs like GandCrab, ‘cryptor’ providers ensured ransomware could not be detected by standard anti-malware scanners. ‘Initial access brokerages’ specialized in stealing credentials and finding vulnerabilities in target networks, selling that access to ransomware operators and affiliates. Bitcoin “tumblers” offered discounts to gangs that used them as a preferred vendor for laundering ransom payments. Some contractors were open to working with any gang, while others entered exclusive partnerships.”

    REvil would evolve into a feared “big-game-hunting” machine capable of extracting hefty extortion payments from victims, largely going after organizations with more than $100 million in annual revenues and fat new cyber insurance policies that were known to pay out.

    Over the July 4, 2021 weekend in the United States, REvil hacked into and extorted Kaseya, a company that handled IT operations for more than 1,500 businesses, nonprofits and government agencies. The FBI would later announce they’d infiltrated the ransomware group’s servers prior to the Kaseya hack but couldn’t tip their hand at the time. REvil never recovered from that core compromise, or from the FBI’s release of a free decryption key for REvil victims who couldn’t or didn’t pay.

    Shchukin is from Krasnodar, Russia and is thought to reside there, the BKA said.

    “Based on the investigations so far, it is assumed that the wanted person is abroad, presumably in Russia,” the BKA advised. “Travel behaviour cannot be ruled out.”

    There is little that connects Shchukin to UNKNOWN’s various accounts on the Russian crime forums. But a review of the Russian crime forums indexed by the cyber intelligence firm Intel 471 shows there is plenty connecting Shchukin to a hacker identity called “Ger0in” who operated large botnets and sold “installs” — allowing other cybercriminals to rapidly deploy malware of their choice to thousands of PCs in one go. However, Ger0in was only active between 2010 and 2011, well before UNKNOWN’s appearance as the REvil front man.

    A review of the mugshots released by the BKA at the image comparison site Pimeyes found a match on this birthday celebration from 2023, which features a young man named Daniel wearing the same fancy watch as in the BKA photos.

    Images from Daniil Shchukin’s birthday party celebration in Krasnodar in 2023.

  • NHS urges public not to delay seeking medical help, ahead of ‘difficult’ strike

    The NHS is urging patients across England not to put off coming forward for the care they need during this week’s resident doctor strikes. Industrial action begins at 7am on Tuesday 7 April and runs for six days until 6:59am on Monday 13 April, with hospital teams across the country working to minimise disruption for patients. In addition to prioritising urgent […]

  • ‘Two weeks will make such a difference’: UK first as NI brings in miscarriage leave

    Northern Ireland becomes first part of UK to bring in legal entitlement for parents affected by miscarriage at any stage of a pregnancy to have paid leave.
  • U.S. Lawmakers Work on Unified Site-Blocking Bill to Counter Online Piracy

    U.S. Lawmakers Work on Unified Site-Blocking Bill to Counter Online Piracy

    The Supreme Court’s decision to reverse the billion-dollar piracy liability verdict against Cox Communications is a major win for Internet service providers.

    It confirms that they can’t be held liable for pirating activities of subscribers or customers unless they actively induce copyright infringement through specific acts, or if their service has no substantial non-infringing uses.

    For rightsholders, however, the ruling represents a significant setback, as it makes it much harder to hold ISPs liable for pirating subscribers.

    Or, as Justice Sotomayor noted in her concurring Supreme Court opinion, the majority’s decision “permits ISPs to sell an internet connection to every single infringer who wants one without fear of liability and without lifting a finger to prevent infringement.”

    The ruling reshapes the liability landscape, giving new urgency to site-blocking efforts.

    Internet providers have previously opposed such legislation over liability concerns. Have those concerns been resolved by the Supreme Court? And where do the U.S. site-blocking legislative efforts stand today?

    A Bicameral, Bipartisan Site Blocking Push

    Last year, several new site-blocking proposals emerged in Congress. In January 2025, Lofgren had filed her Foreign Anti-Digital Piracy Act (FADPA) in the House. A few months later, Senator Tillis announced a draft of the Block BEARD Act, with bipartisan support from Senators Chris Coons, Marsha Blackburn, and Adam Schiff.

    At the time, the House and Senate efforts were not coordinated. That has changed.

    TorrentFreak has learned that, over the past months, Senator Tillis and Representative Lofgren have been working on a draft that would combine their separate site-blocking proposals into a single piece of legislation.

    The unified approach marks a significant shift from the fragmented approach of the past year.

    No draft text has been circulated publicly, and sources could not provide a specific timeline for introduction beyond noting it would need to happen before Tillis’s term ends in January 2027.

    One possibility mentioned by sources is that the legislation could be attached to an omnibus spending bill. For now, however, that remains speculative.

    Targeting ISPs and DNS Resolvers

    While detailed specifics on the bill will have to wait until a draft is circulating, it is expected that the legislation will require both ISPs and large DNS providers to block foreign pirate sites.

    This is in line with Lofgren’s original FADPA bill, which specifically included DNS resolvers with more than $100 million in annual revenue. Tillis’s Block BEARD act does not mention DNS resolvers, but uses the Section 512(k)(1)(A) DMCA service provider definition, which is wide enough to capture them.

    The inclusion of DNS resolvers is significant, as it brings tech companies such as Google and Cloudflare into the mix. Targeting DNS resolvers is relatively novel internationally, as most site-blocking regimes do not explicitly include DNS providers.

    We reached out to Google and Cloudflare, requesting comment, but they did not reply before publication. However, these companies have appealed similar blocking requests elsewhere, including in France, so they likely have reservations.

    Notably, last year the Internet Infrastructure Coalition (I2Coalition), which represents major tech companies including Amazon, Cloudflare, and Google, launched its DNS at Risk campaign, warning the public about such DNS blocking threats.

    Support and Opposition

    Rightsholder groups including the RIAA, MPA, and Creative Future have supported the site-blocking efforts, while consumer advocates have raised concerns. However, the public discourse has been relatively quiet compared to the SOPA debates in 2012.

    Times have changed and site blocking is much more common today than it was back then. That said, discussions, support, and critique will likely pick up when the legislation moves forward.

    It is notable, however, that Representative Lofgren’s leading role is a shift from her position during the SOPA debates. At the time, she was among the fiercest opponents of SOPA in 2012, warning that blocking threatened the open internet.

    Lofgren believes that her FADPA proposal is a “smart, targeted approach” that is mindful of due process, and respects free speech while using a narrow and targeted blocking approach.

    Rep. Issa’s Wild Card

    Running parallel to the Tillis-Lofgren effort is a separate proposal from Representative Darrell Issa, chairman of the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual Property, and the Internet.

    Issa’s American Copyright Protection Act (ACPA) has been circulated in draft form for a while but has not been formally introduced. The bill takes a different procedural path. Rather than relying on standard district court jurisdiction, ACPA proposes that the Judicial Conference of the United States maintain a roster of designated judges to hear all piracy blocking cases.

    Whether the Tillis-Lofgren framework and Issa’s separate effort will eventually converge remains unclear. Sources indicate that, in earlier stages, these were two separate, uncoordinated tracks.

    Issa’s proposal also includes DNS resolvers. At the same time, it also addresses overblocking concerns directly. If a third party’s site is blocked due to an error caused by the copyright owner, the third party could request up to $250,000 in compensation from the rightsholder.

    The Timeline

    At the time of writing, the introduction timeline for the bicameral bill is unknown. However, Senator Tillis is not running for reelection. That gives him until January 2027 to advance the legislation and also creates a hard deadline.

    Whether the bill surfaces as standalone legislation, gets attached to an omnibus spending package, or eventually blends with Issa’s separate ACPA proposal has yet to be seen. But it’s clear that, behind the scenes, lawmakers are still working on getting it ready.

    With the Cox decision reshaping the legal landscape, site-blocking efforts have gained new urgency for both ISPs, DNS providers, and rightsholders.

    From: TF, for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

  • Transit Live Mapping Solutions

    Hi, we are Transit Live Mapping Solutions,
    Enhancing openness and promoting access to Dresden public infrastructure data since 2022.

    a small group of students, currently consisting of Marenz, Tassilo and 0xA, that ended up getting seriously nerdsniped by something that started off as a small side-project during lockdown.

    Our aim is to collect reliable real time information about public transport and make it available to everyone in a straightforward way. We are convinced that open data for commonly shared infrastructure will help contribute to a more efficient and safe state of operation. Check out the map to see what we’ve built so far.

  • Dr. Vinay Prasad Said He Would Deliver New COVID Vaccine RCTs. He Failed and Should STFU.

    It turns out that Tweeting about RCTs 100+ times is a lot easier than delivering even a single RCT.

    The post Dr. Vinay Prasad Said He Would Deliver New COVID Vaccine RCTs. He Failed and Should STFU. first appeared on Science-Based Medicine.

  • Pluralistic: EU ready to cave to Trump on tech (04 Apr 2026)

    Today’s links

    • EU ready to cave to Trump on tech: Surrendermonkeys ahoy.
    • Hey look at this: Delights to delectate.
    • Object permanence: “Among a Thousand Fireflies”; “fiscal” not “physical”; Ontario’s pusher premiere can’t distribute vaccines; You need your head examined (if you trust an AI therapist); Women tell Pence about their periods; Zombie economy and digital arm-breakers; The trouble with tariffs.
    • Upcoming appearances: Toronto, Montreal, Toronto, San Francisco, London, Berlin, NYC, Hay-on-Wye, London.
    • Recent appearances: Where I’ve been.
    • Latest books: You keep readin’ em, I’ll keep writin’ ’em.
    • Upcoming books: Like I said, I’ll keep writin’ ’em.
    • Colophon: All the rest.


    The EU flag. The field has been turned from blue to orange. In the center of the circle of stars is Trump's open, hooting gob. Behind the orange field we see the faded traces of a printed circuit board.

    EU ready to cave to Trump on tech (permalink)

    Crises precipitate change. That’s no reason to induce a crisis, but you’d be a fool to let a crisis go to waste. Donald Trump is the greatest crisis of our young century, and the EU looks set to squander the opportunity, to its own terrible detriment.

    For more than a decade, it’s been clear that the American internet was not fit for purpose. The whistleblowers Mark Klein and Edward Snowden revealed that the US had weaponized its status as the world’s transoceanic fiber-optic hub to spy on the entire planet:

    https://doctorow.medium.com/https-pluralistic-net-2025-11-26-difficult-multipolarism-eurostack-5a527c32f149

    US tech giants flouted privacy laws, gleefully plundering the world’s cash and data with products that they remorselessly enshittified:

    https://pluralistic.net/2026/01/30/zucksauce/#gandersauce

    American companies repurposed their over-the-air software update capabilities to remotely brick expensive machinery in service to geopolitical priorities:

    https://pluralistic.net/2022/05/08/about-those-kill-switched-ukrainian-tractors/

    Then Trump and his tech companies started attacking key public institutions around the world, shutting down access for senior judges who attempted to hold Trump’s international authoritarian allies to account for their crimes:

    https://pluralistic.net/2025/10/20/post-american-internet/#huawei-with-american-characteristics

    If Trump wants to steal Greenland, he doesn’t need tanks or missiles. He can just tell Microsoft and Oracle to brick the entire Danish state and all of its key firms, blocking their access to their email archives, files, databases, and other key administrative tools. If Denmark still holds out, Trump can brick all their tractors, smart speakers, and phones. If Denmark still won’t give up Greenland, Trump could blackhole all Danish IP addresses for the world’s majority of transoceanic fiber. At the click of a mouse, Trump could shut down the world’s supply of Lego, Ozempic, and delicious, lethally strong black licorice.

    Now, these latent offensive capabilities were obvious long before Trump, but the presidents who weaponized them in the pre-Trump era did so in subtle and deniable ways, or under a state of exception (e.g. in response to spectacular terrorist attacks or in the immediate aftermath of the Russian invasion of Ukraine) that let bystanders assure themselves that this wouldn’t become a routine policy.

    After all, America profited so much from the status quo in which America and its trading partners all pretended that US tech wouldn’t be weaponized for geopolitical aims, so a US president would be a fool to shatter the illusion. And even if the president was so emotionally incontinent that he demanded the naked weaponization of America’s defective, boobytrapped tech exports, the power blocs that the president relies on would stop him, because they are so marinated in the rich broth that America drained from the world using Big Tech.

    This is “status quo bias” in action. No one wants to let go of the vine they’re swinging from until they have a new vine firmly in their grasp – but you can’t reach the next vine unless you release your death-grip on your current one. So it was that, year after year, the world allowed itself to become more dependent on America’s easily weaponizable tech, making the tech both more dangerous and harder to escape.

    Enter Trump (a crisis) (and crises precipitate change). Under Trump, the illusion of a safe interdependence crumbled. Every day, in new and increasingly alarming ways, Trump makes it clear that America doesn’t have allies or trading partners, only adversaries and rivals. Every day, Trump proves to the world that American tech isn’t merely untrustworthy – it’s a live, dire, urgent danger to your state, your companies, and your people. The best time to get shut of the American internet was 15 years ago. The second best time is right fucking now.

    NOW!

    The result is the burgeoning movement to build a “post-American internet.” In Canada, PM Mark Carney’s announcement of a “rupture” has the country rethinking its deep connections to the American internet and asking what it could do to escape it:

    https://pluralistic.net/2026/01/27/i-want-to-do-it/#now-make-me-do-it

    Europe, meanwhile, has multiple, advanced, well-funded initiatives to leave the American internet behind and migrate to a post-American internet, like “Eurostack” and the European Digital Infrastructure Consortium:

    https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/edic

    But status quo bias exerts a powerful gravity. A reactionary counterrevolution is being waged in the European Commission – the permanent bureaucracy that executes Europe’s laws and regulations. Within the EC, an ascendant faction has announced plans for a “dialogue” with representatives from the Trump regime to let them direct the enforcement of the Digital Markets Act (DMA) and Digital Services Act (DSA), Europe’s landmark 2024 anti-Big Tech regulations:

    https://www.politico.eu/article/fatal-decision-eu-slammed-for-caving-to-us-pressure-on-digital-rules/

    The DMA and DSA require America’s tech giants to open up their platforms in ways that would halt the plunder of Europeans’ private data and cash. US tech giants have flatly refused to comply with these rules, relying on Trump to get them out of any obligations under EU law:

    https://pluralistic.net/2025/09/26/empty-threats/#500-million-affluent-consumers

    That’s a sound bet. After all, the last thing Trump did before his inauguration was publicly announce his intention to destroy any country that attempted to enforce these laws:

    https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/23/us/politics/trump-davos-europe-tariffs.html

    He’s making good on his threats. He’s already sanctioned a group of officials who helped draft the DSA:

    https://www.npr.org/2025/12/24/nx-s1-5655855/trump-administration-bars-5-europeans-from-entry-to-the-u-s-over-alleged-censorship

    And he’s ordered his tech companies to turn over the private emails and messages of other European officials, so he can identify the ones most dangerous to US tech plunder and sanction them, too:

    https://www.politico.eu/article/us-congress-judiciary-committee-big-tech-private-communication-eu-officials/

    The quislings and appeasers in the Commission who’ve been spooked by Trump’s belligerence (or tempted by offers of cushy jobs in Big Tech after they leave public service) are selling out the EU’s future. Caving to Trump won’t make him more favorably disposed to Europe or Europeans. Trump treats every capitulation as a sign of weakness that signals that he can safely ignore his end of the bargain and demand twice as much. For Trump, the “art of the deal” can be summed up in one word: reneging.

    Within the EU, there’s fury at the Commission’s announcement of “dialogue.” As Politico‘s Milena Wälde reports, lawmakers like Alexandra Geese (Greens) say that this is a move that eliminates the “sovereign path for Europe” by letting tech giants “grade their own homework.” She calls it a “fatal decision for our companies and our democracy.”

    Moving to the post-American internet is hard – but it will only get harder. Sure, Europe could wait for the next crisis to let go of the Big Tech vine and grab the Eurostack one, but that next crisis will be far, far worse. The EU can’t afford to wait for Trump to brick one or more of its member states to (finally, at long last) take this threat seriously:

    https://pluralistic.net/2026/01/01/39c3/#the-new-coalition

    Hey look at this (permalink)


    A shelf of leatherbound history books with a gilt-stamped series title, 'The World's Famous Events.'

    Object permanence (permalink)

    #10yrsago Among a Thousand Fireflies: children’s book shows the sweet, alien love stories unfolding in our own backyards https://memex.craphound.com/2016/04/01/among-a-thousand-fireflies-childrens-book-shows-the-sweet-alien-love-stories-unfolding-in-our-own-backyards/

    #10yrsago After biggest bribery scandal in history, police raids and investigations https://www.smh.com.au/business/police-raids-and-more-revelations-the-fallout-of-the-unaoil-scandal-20160401-gnw9mx.html

    #10yrsago Bernie Sanders’ South Bronx rally, featuring Rosario Dawson, Spike Lee, and Residente https://www.c-span.org/program/campaign-2016/senator-bernie-sanders-campaign-rally-in-south-bronx/437114

    #10yrsago Freshman Missouri Rep almost made it 3 months before introducing bill urging members to say “fiscal,” not “physical” https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/03/31/hero-lawmaker-urges-colleagues-to-stop-saying-physical-when-they-mean-fiscal/

    #10yrsago Indiana women phone the governor’s office to tell him about their periods https://web.archive.org/web/20160401170206/https://fusion.net/story/286941/periods-for-pence-indiana-women-calling-governor/

    #10yrsago United pilot orders Arab-American family off his flight for “safety” https://www.nbcchicago.com/news/national-international/united-airlines-arab-american-plane/58370/

    #10yrsago 33 state Democratic parties launder $26M from millionaires for Hillary https://www.counterpunch.org/2016/04/01/how-hillary-clinton-bought-the-loyalty-of-33-state-democratic-parties/

    #10yrsago White SC cops pull black passenger out of car, take turns publicly cavity-searching him https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-watch/wp/2016/04/01/video-shows-white-cops-performing-roadside-cavity-search-of-black-man/

    #5yrsago The zombie economy and digital arm-breakers https://pluralistic.net/2021/04/02/innovation-unlocks-markets/#digital-arm-breakers

    #5yrsago Ontario’s drug-dealer premier is shockingly bad at distributing vaccines https://pluralistic.net/2021/04/01/incompetent-drug-dealer/#what-a-dope

    #5yrsago The zombie economy and digital arm-breakers https://pluralistic.net/2021/04/02/innovation-unlocks-markets/#digital-arm-breakers

    #1yrago What’s wrong with tariffs https://pluralistic.net/2025/04/02/me-or-your-lying-eyes/#spherical-cows-on-frictionless-surfaces

    #1yrago What’s wrong with tariffs https://pluralistic.net/2025/04/02/me-or-your-lying-eyes/#spherical-cows-on-frictionless-surfaces

    #1yrago Anyone who trusts an AI therapist needs their head examined https://pluralistic.net/2025/04/01/doctor-robo-blabbermouth/#fool-me-once-etc-etc

    Upcoming appearances (permalink)

    A photo of me onstage, giving a speech, pounding the podium.


    A screenshot of me at my desk, doing a livecast.

    Recent appearances (permalink)


    A grid of my books with Will Stahle covers..

    Latest books (permalink)


    A cardboard book box with the Macmillan logo.

    Upcoming books (permalink)

    • “The Reverse-Centaur’s Guide to AI,” a short book about being a better AI critic, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, June 2026 (https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374621568/thereversecentaursguidetolifeafterai/)

    • “Enshittification, Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It” (the graphic novel), Firstsecond, 2026

    • “The Post-American Internet,” a geopolitical sequel of sorts to Enshittification, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2027

    • “Unauthorized Bread”: a middle-grades graphic novel adapted from my novella about refugees, toasters and DRM, FirstSecond, 2027

    • “The Memex Method,” Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 2027


    Colophon (permalink)

    Today’s top sources:

    Currently writing: “The Post-American Internet,” a sequel to “Enshittification,” about the better world the rest of us get to have now that Trump has torched America. First draft complete. Second draft underway.

    • “The Reverse Centaur’s Guide to AI,” a short book for Farrar, Straus and Giroux about being an effective AI critic. LEGAL REVIEW AND COPYEDIT COMPLETE.

    • “The Post-American Internet,” a short book about internet policy in the age of Trumpism. PLANNING.

    • A Little Brother short story about DIY insulin PLANNING

    This work – excluding any serialized fiction – is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. That means you can use it any way you like, including commercially, provided that you attribute it to me, Cory Doctorow, and include a link to pluralistic.net.

    https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

    Quotations and images are not included in this license; they are included either under a limitation or exception to copyright, or on the basis of a separate license. Please exercise caution.

    How to get Pluralistic:

    Blog (no ads, tracking, or data-collection):

    Pluralistic.net

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    https://pluralistic.net/plura-list

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    https://mamot.fr/@pluralistic

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    https://bsky.app/profile/doctorow.pluralistic.net

    Medium (no ads, paywalled):

    https://doctorow.medium.com/

    Tumblr (mass-scale, unrestricted, third-party surveillance and advertising):

    https://mostlysignssomeportents.tumblr.com/tagged/pluralistic

    “When life gives you SARS, you make sarsaparilla” -Joey “Accordion Guy” DeVilla

    READ CAREFULLY: By reading this, you agree, on behalf of your employer, to release me from all obligations and waivers arising from any and all NON-NEGOTIATED agreements, licenses, terms-of-service, shrinkwrap, clickwrap, browsewrap, confidentiality, non-disclosure, non-compete and acceptable use policies (“BOGUS AGREEMENTS”) that I have entered into with your employer, its partners, licensors, agents and assigns, in perpetuity, without prejudice to my ongoing rights and privileges. You further represent that you have the authority to release me from any BOGUS AGREEMENTS on behalf of your employer.

    ISSN: 3066-764X

  • Triple Header for Privacy’s Defender in New York

    You’re invited on a journey inside the privacy battles that shaped the internet. EFF’s Executive Director Cindy Cohn has tangled with the feds, fought for your data security, and argued before judges to protect our access to science and knowledge on the internet.

    Join Cindy at three events in New York discussing her bestselling new book: Privacy’s Defender: My Thirty-Year Fight Against Digital Surveillance, on sale now. All proceeds from the book benefit EFF. Find the full event details below, and RSVP to let us know if you can make it.

    April 20 – With Women in Security and Privacy (WISP)

    Join Women in Security and Privacy (WISP) and EFF for a conversation featuring American University Senior Professorial Lecturer Chelsea Horne and EFF Executive Director Cindy Cohn as they dive into data security, Federal access to data, and your digital rights.

    Privacy’s Defender with WISP
    Kennedys
    22 Vanderbilt Avenue, Suite 2400, New York, NY 10017
    Monday, April 20, 2026
    6:00 pm to 8:00 pm
    REGISTER NOW

    April 21 – With Julie Samuels at Civic Hall

    Join Tech:NYC President and CEO Julie Samuels, in conversation with EFF Executive Director Cindy Cohn for a discussion about Cindy’s work, her new book, and what we’re all wondering: Can have private conversations if we live our lives online?

    Privacy’s Defender at Civic Hall
    Civic Hall
    124 E 14th St, New York, NY 10003
    Tuesday, April 21, 2026
    6:00 pm to 9:00 pm
    REGISTER NOW

    April 23 – With Anil Dash at Brooklyn Public Library

    Join antitech Principal & Cofounder Anil Dash, in conversation with EFF Executive Director Cindy Cohn to discuss Cindy’s new book: Privacy’s Defender: My Thirty-Year Fight Against Digital Surveillance.

    Privacy’s Defender at Brooklyn Public Library
    Brooklyn Public Library – Central Library, Info Commons Lab
    10 Grand Army Plz 1st floor, Brooklyn, NY 11238
    Thursday, April 23, 2026
    6:00 pm to 7:30 pm
    REGISTER NOW

    “Privacy’s Defender is a compelling account of a life well lived and an inspiring call to action for the next generation of civil liberties champions.”
    ~Edward Snowden, whistleblower; author of Permanent Record

    Can’t make it? Look for Cindy at a city (or web connection) near you! Find the latest tour dates on the Privacy’s Defender hub or follow EFF for more.

    Part memoir and part legal history for the general reader, Privacy’s Defender is a compelling testament to just how much privacy and free expression matter in our efforts to combat authoritarianism, grow democracy, and strengthen human rights. Thank you for being a part of that fight.

    Want to support the cause and get a copy of the new book? New or renewing EFF members can preorder one as their annual gift!

  • A Revolutionary’s Warning on Iran

    A Revolutionary’s Warning on Iran

    Afshin Matin-Asgari has spent decades studying the long, fraught history between Iran and the United States—and as a former participant in the 1979 revolution, who opposed both the Shah and the Islamic Republic that replaced him, his perspective is shaped by direct experience as much as scholarship.

    The historian and author of Axis of Empire: A History of Iran–US Relations joined Current Affairs to discuss what history can tell us about the present crisis: from the lasting effects of the 1953 Iranian coup d’état to the myths surrounding Iranian politics and nuclear ambitions.

    As calls for regime change grow louder in Washington D.C. and Tel Aviv, Matin-Asgari insists that the future of Iran must be determined not by bombs or sanctions, but by the Iranian people themselves.

  • The FAA’s “Temporary” Flight Restriction for Drones is a Blatant Attempt to Criminalize Filming ICE

    Legal intern Raj Gambhir was the principal author of this post.

    The Trump administration has restricted the First Amendment right to record law enforcement by issuing an unprecedented nationwide flight restriction preventing private drone operators, including professional and citizen journalists, from flying drones within half a mile of any ICE or CBP vehicle.

    In January, EFF and media organizations including The New York Times and The Washington Post responded to this blatant infringement of the First Amendment by demanding that the FAA lift this flight restriction. Over two months later, we’re still waiting for the FAA to respond to our letter.

    The First Amendment guarantees the right to record law enforcement. As we have seen with the extrajudicial killings of George Floyd, Renée Good, and Alex Pretti, capturing law enforcement on camera can drive accountability and raise awareness of police misconduct.

    A 21-Month Long “Temporary” Flight Restriction?

    The FAA regularly issues temporary flight restrictions (TFRs) to prevent people from flying into designated airspace. TFRs are usually issued during natural disasters, or to protect major sporting events and government officials like the president, and in most cases last mere hours.

    Not so with the restriction numbered FDC 6/4375, which started on January 16, 2026. This TFR lasts for 21 months—until October 29, 2027—and covers the entire nation. It prevents any person from flying any unmanned aircraft (i.e., a drone) within 3000 feet, measured horizontally, of any of the “facilities and mobile assets,” including “ground vehicle convoys and their associated escorts,” of the Departments of Defense, Energy, Justice, and Homeland Security. Violators can be subject to criminal and civil penalties, and risk having their drones seized or destroyed.

    In practical terms, this TFR means that anyone flying their drone within a half mile of an ICE or CBP agent’s car (a DHS “mobile asset”) is liable to face criminal charges and have their drone shot down. The practical unfairness of this TFR is underscored by the fact that immigration agents often use unmarked rental cars, use cars without license plates, or switch the license plates of their cars to carry out their operations. Nor do they provide prior warning of those operations.

    The TFR is an Unconstitutional Infringement of Free Speech

    While the FAA asserts that the TFR is grounded in its lawful authority, the flight restriction not only violates multiple constitutional rights, but also the agency’s own regulations.

    First Amendment violation. As we highlighted in the letter, nearly every federal appeals court has recognized the First Amendment right of Americans to record law enforcement officers performing their official duties. By subjecting drone operators to criminal and civil penalties, along with the potential destruction or seizure of their drone, the TFR punishes—without the required justifications—lawful recording of law enforcement officers, including immigration agents.  

    Fifth Amendment violation. The Fifth Amendment guarantees the right to due process, which includes being given fair notice before being deprived of liberty or property by the government. Under the flight restriction, advanced notice isn’t even possible. As discussed above, drone operators can’t know whether they are within 3000 horizontal feet of unmarked DHS vehicles. Yet the TFR allows the government to capture or even shoot down a drone if it flies within the TFR radius, and to impose criminal and civil penalties on the operator.

    Violations of FAA regulations. In issuing a TFR, the FAA’s own regulations require the agency to “specify[] the hazard or condition requiring” the restriction. Furthermore, the FAA must provide accredited news representatives with a point of contact to obtain permission to fly drones within the restricted area. The FAA has satisfied neither of these requirements in issuing its nationwide ban on drones getting near government vehicles.

    EFF Demands Rescission of the TFR

    We don’t believe it’s a coincidence that the TFR was put in place in January 2026, at the height of the Minneapolis anti-ICE protests, shortly after the killing of Renée Good and shortly before the shooting of Alex Pretti. After both of those tragedies, civilian recordings played a vital role in contradicting the government’s false account of the events.

    By punishing civilians for recording federal law enforcement officers, the TFR helps to shield ICE and other immigration agents from scrutiny and accountability. It also discourages the exercise of a key First Amendment right. EFF has long advocated for the right to record the police, and exercising that right today is more important than ever.

    Finally, while recording law enforcement is protected by the First Amendment, be aware that officers may retaliate against you for exercising this right. Please refer to our guidance on safely recording law enforcement activities.