PRESS RELEASE: Internet’s largest sites join activists to Reset the Net: WordPress, Twitter, Tumblr, Dropbox, Mozilla, Google, CloudFlare, Sendgrid all join campaign to block surveillance and secure the web.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Media Contact: Ellen Satterwhite
Email: esatterwhite@glenechogroup.com
Phone: (719) 963-2722

Internet Users, Activists, and Tech Companies Unite to Shut Off Large Parts of the Web to Mass Government Spying

On the first anniversary of Snowden’s whistleblowing, Internet users and the largest tech companies in the world including WordPress, Google, Mozilla, Tumblr, Twitter, Dropbox, Sendgrid and CloudFlare turn off weak security and turn on privacy, all over the web.

June 5, 2014 – Today as part of Reset the Net, tens of thousands of Internet users and the Internet’s largest companies rallied to protect billions. These companies and users interfered directly interfering in the NSA’s runaway surveillance programs by securing websites, apps, and services while supporting the largest ever movement in history to spread encryption tools and collectively improve the security of the web. Reset the Net demands that web services take concrete steps to protect their users from government snooping, while encouraging everyday Internet users to adopt free and open source privacy tools.

Companies like Twitter, Dropbox, Tumblr, WordPress and Mozilla have stood up to support Reset the Net. Today, additional companies have announced specific ways they will help the Internet become opaque to government eyes including:

  • WordPress: announced they will be Installing default SSL on all sites hosted on WordPress.com, affecting millions of sites. WordPress powers 22% of the websites sites on the internet

  • Tumblr: Announcing they’ll be adding SSL by default, protecting the readers of their 189 million blogs

  • Sendgrid: Adding TLS encryption on all outgoing mail (this affects billions of emails per month)

  • Reform Government Surveillance Group: A group of major technology company CEO’s sent a letter to Congress and called on the world’s governments to address the practices and laws regulating government surveillance of individuals and access to their information

  • Yahoo: Pressuring the Senate to fight surveillance, using the hashtag #ResetTheNet

  • Google: Announced in a blog post that they are joining Reset the Net and launching a new, open source end-to-end encrypted email project. They are also promoting apps from the Privacy Pack in the Google Play store on June 5th.

  • Mozilla (creator of Firefox): Encouraging its community to take the pledge, and to use the security tools in Firefox.

  • CloudFlare: Added Reset the Net splash screen as an official app to be used by their millions of websites

  • DuckDuckGo, SpiderOak, Disconnect.Me, Thunderclap, Piwik, Golden Frog, StartPage, AdBlockPlus, Piwik, Crowdtilt, Silent Circle, and thousands of other websites will promote the privacy pack on June 5th as part of Reset the Net.

  • Free Software Foundation: Released a guide to encrypted email

  • Minecraft: Pushing out an education campaign on the importance of privacy, and helping thousands of users access tools to prevent bulk data collection

  • Namecheap: The leading domain registrar has already sold thousands of discounted SSL domains as part of a Reset the Net promotion, with a portion of the proceeds going to Fight for the Future.

  • reddit is running free ads to promote privacy tools in the coming weeks and helping promote the Reset the Net privacy pack

To find out more about the Reset the Net movement, please visit: https://www.resetthenet.org/ and follow the hashtag #ResetTheNet on Twitter.

About Fight for the Future

Fight for the Future works to activate the Internet community to fight for a free and open Internet., and our basic rights and freedoms. Founded in 2011, we’re known for effective, viral organizing and mass engagement through the distributed organizing platforms we’ve built, including the Internet Defense League. For more information, visit www.fightforthefuture.org and follow us on Facebook and Twitter.