This past April, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a donor-funded, nonprofit group of lawyers, policy analysts, activists, and technologists dedicated to defending consumer digital rights, launched a campaign called "Who Has Your Back". The campaign called for thirteen top technology companies to sign a petition agreeing to to stand with their users in court and be transparent in their practices with regard to data demands and government requests.

Today, the EFF announced that two more of those thirteen companies, Apple and Dropbox, have stepped up and joined the Digital Due Process coalition. This coalition of privacy advocates along with major corporations is working to see surveillance laws modernized for the Internet age. The DDP coalition is particularly focused on getting Congress to updated the Electronic Communications Privacy Act; this Act was adopted in 1986, before things like the internet even existed, and is considered by many to be a little out of date. However, the ECPA remains the primary law governing how and when law enforcement can access personal information and private communications stored by communications providers like Google, Facebook, your cell phone company or your ISP.

By joining the Digital Due Process coalition, Apple and Dropbox are committing to fight to protect your rights in the effort to update the ECPA, and for that they both get a new gold star from the Electronic Frontier Foundation. 

Via The Next Web

Adrian covers daily news as well as the weekly Law & Apple column for MacLife.com. You can follow him on Twitter, if you want to.