Rebecca Jeshke from the Electronic Frontier Foundation sez, "Most Americans know very little about how the law protects them from searches, seizures, and surveillance. EFF launched Surveillance Self-Defense today — a practical, online how-to guide for protecting your private data against government spying. The guide includes tips on assessing the security risks to your personal computer files and communications, strategies for interacting with law enforcement, and articles on specific defensive technologies such as encryption that can help protect the privacy of your data."

Surveillance Self-Defense (SSD) exists to answer two main questions: What can the government legally do to spy on your computer data and communications? And what can you legally do to protect yourself against such spying?

After an introductory discussion of how you should think about making security decisions – it's all about risk management – we'll be answering those two questions for three types of data:

First, we're going to talk about the threat to the data stored on your computer posed by searches and seizures by law enforcement, as well as subpoenas demanding your records.

Second, we're going to talk about the threat to your data on the wire – that is, your data as it's being transmitted – posed by wiretapping and other real-time surveillance of your telephone and Internet communications by law enforcement.

Third, we're going to describe the information about you that is stored by third parties like your phone company and your Internet service provider, and how law enforcement officials can get it.

In each of these three sections, we're going to give you practical advice about how to protect your private data against law enforcement agents.