This Week in Technology + Press Freedom: March 29, 2020 – Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press

Heres what the staff of the Technology and Press Freedom Project at the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press is tracking this week.

At a time when the public is trying tosift through misinformationand stay up to date on accurate news about COVID-19, the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press haspublished resourcesfeaturing recommendations for journalists, legislators, and courts to ensure that the press and the publics right of access to information is protected.

As government entities take necessary steps to curb the spread of the virus, reporters may have questions about how to navigate these changes. Press freedom and government transparency during COVID-19 answers frequently asked questions on various topics, including Emergency Powers and the Press, Open Meetings and Public Records, and Court Access.

For example, the resources urge state and local emergency authorities to define news media organizations as essential or life-sustaining businesses in any shelter-in-place or lockdown orders. We call on government officials to provide as much advance notice to the public if public meetings are moving to online or telephonic formats, and urge officials to, when possible, record meetings and promptly make them available to the public online. They also advocate for courts to maintain filings and records and make them promptly available to the public electronically.

Our attorneys are actively trackingemergency measures,public records and open meetings measures, andcourt access measuresat the federal, state, and local levels.

As responses to the pandemic evolve, the Reporters Committee will continue to update these resources in real time. For our readers who have updates about government responses to COVID-19 that could impact newsgathering rights or public access, please submit them tomedia@rcfp.org. And as always, for specific legal questions or concerns, please reach out to the Reporters Committeeshotlineathotline@rcfp.org.

Lyndsey Wajert

A new cybercrime bill that includes language that would amend and expand the Computer Fraud and Abuse Actis raising concerns among civil liberties groups. Were it to pass with the CFAA expansion, the Defending American Security from Kremlin Aggression Act of 2019 would amend several sections of the law, including a provision that could be used against computer security researchers who identify vulnerabilities in systems or software (an activity that resembles journalism, in many ways) and another that allows private companies to get broad civil orders to shut down botnets.

The editorial board of The Orange County Registerhas demandedthe city of Fullerton, California, end its lawsuit against several local bloggers who the city alleges hacked their Dropbox account, calling the suit anti-speech. Most recently, the citysecured a gag orderagainst the bloggers, who run a site called Friends for Fullertons Future, preventing them from publishing documents obtained from the citys Dropbox account, which was not protected by security credentials and was accessible by anyone on the internet. But this gag order was stayed in part by the appellate court pending resolution of the merits of the case. The Reporters Committee previouslyfiled a briefin the case, explaining how the citys expansive interpretation of the hacking laws could pose a severe threat to newsgathering.

Privacy commissioners in various countries arelifting data restrictionsto help health officials use health and location data to combat the spread of COVID-19. The Markupwroteabout steps that could be taken to better protect against deanonymization in large datasets (that is, when various pieces of otherwise anonymized data can be cross-referenced to identify a specific individual).

In an open letter, the publishers of The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Wall Street Journalcalled on Chinese officialsto reverse their decision torevoke the press credentialsfor the news organizations China-based reporters.

Lawyers for Julian Assange last weekappliedfor the WikiLeaks founders release on bail, citing the risk of contracting COVID-19 in prison. A judgedeniedthe request on Wednesday.

The Reynolds Journalism Institute at the University of Missouris School of Journalism has somesuggestionsfor how news organizations with drones can capitalize on the decrease in pedestrian or vehicular traffic caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, including examining the conditions of empty roads to demonstrate the possible need for infrastructure investments.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuitdeclinedto review a prior three-judge panel ruling that blocking critics on President Trumps Twitter account, which he uses for official business, violated the First Amendment.

The Pentagon reportedlywill not splitits cloud-computing contract for the Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure, or JEDI project, between Microsoft and Amazon. Amazon haschallengedthe governments decision to award the contract to Microsoft in court.

Smart reads

Poynteroffersa few helpful ways journalists reporting on the frontlines of this pandemic can de-stress. Take care of yourselves, but know that you are providing an essential service!

Gif of the Week:When weekly meetings involve slightly smaller colleagues.

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This Week in Technology + Press Freedom: March 29, 2020 - Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press