Cindy Cohn: Confronting the Surveillance State

We are awash in mass surveillance, and increasingly technology is being marshaled by the government against its political opponents
Networks of automated license plate readers (e.g. Flock and Vigilant Solutions) blanket public and private roadways and parking lots. These networks often allow searches by law enforcement, including across jurisdictions. They are, for example, being used to track people seeking abortions across state lines.
Facial recognition tools, once the province of only the more elite parts of federal law enforcement, are increasingly used by ICE agents on immigrants and protesters, in airports by the TSA, as well as by private entities, like Madison Square Garden.
Modern phones track users’ locations constantly – and that information is readily available to law enforcement, often with only minimal process protections.
All these developments hover around the concern Cohn has spent 30 years working on: Can we still have private conversations if we live our lives online?
Digital privacy, Cohn argues in her bestselling book, Privacy's Defender, is central to all our other rights, including our ability to organize and make change in the world.