A federal judge ruled that a 2004 gag order on Calyx Internet Access for a National Security Letter (NSL) violated the First Amendment. Under the order, Calyx officials could not even identify the company. The court found that the government had not shown that releasing information about the NSL would cause any substantial harm. (techdirt, September 15, 2015, by Mike Masnick)
The decision will allow Nicholas Merrill, the Calyx executive director, to reveal the extent of the FBI’s reach in spying on individual’s digital activity. Thousands of NSLs are issued annually without judicial oversight. (Yale News, September 15, 2015)
The case against Merill ended in before 2010 but the FBI maintained the gag order. Merill wrote a column in The Washington Post in 2011 arguing that the gag order was a burden because he was the lead spokesperson for Calyx a nonprofit that “promotes ‘best practices’ with regard to privacy and freedom of expression in the telecommunications industry.” (engadget, September 15, 2015, by Steve Dent)