Today, La Quadrature du Net publishes the English version of its booklet on algorithmic videosurveillance (“AVS”). This document gathers all our work on this topic, in the hope of making it as accessible as possible. It explain what AVS is, how it works, the...
La Quadrature du Net
Festival – The Cloud Was Beneath Our Feet
Data centers, these concrete mega-computers that process and store our digital data are proliferating all over the world. They are monopolising water and electricity, generating environmental pollution and soil artificialisation, multiplying land grabbing and the...
It’s not AI, it’s state-of-the-art exploitation
After two years spent diversifying its fields of action, La Quadrature du Net is now tackling a new front: the fight against the onslaught of artificial intelligence (AI) in all areas of society. To help keep the critique of authoritarian and ecocidal digital...
Investigation: in Marseille as elsewhere, digital infrastructures are taking over the territory
Since the end of 2023, the Marseille collective Le Nuage était sous nos pieds (The cloud was beneath our feet) has been investigating, analysing and fighting against the social, ecological and political impacts of digital infrastructures in Marseilles, in particular...
We’re leaving Twitter…
We have decided to leave X, formerly Twitter, on Monday, January 20, 2025. This decision is carefully considered. Twitter has long encouraged hate speech and harassment, but in recent months it has become the preferred space for the far right to express itself. We are...
Justice finally finds Briefcam unlawful
Yesterday, we achieved a great victory before the Grenoble administrative court! In La Quadrature du Net vs the city of Moirans, Isère, we obtained a decision recognizing the illegality of Briefcam’s algorithmic video surveillance software. The court ordered the town...
Launch of the Hiatus Coalition, to Resist AI and its World
This text is the founding manifesto of “Hiatus”, a coalition of a diverse range of French civil society organizations that intend to resist the massive and widespread deployment of artificial intelligence (AI). In the run-up to the AI summit organized by France on...
AI Action Summit: Accelerating, whatever the cost
The Paris summit on artificial intelligence (AI) organized by France was held on February 10 and 11, 2025. It will go down in history as a great moment of acceleration. While French civil society is organizing, particularly through the coalition Hiatus launched on the...
All-out mobilization against the French “war-on-drugs” law
In the midst of the media uproar over drug trafficking, a law on “drug trafficking” is passing through Parliament. In reality, this text does not only apply to the sale of narcotics and leads to a heavy reinforcement of the surveillance capacities of the intelligence...
« Simplification » Bill: a denial of democracy to impose giant data centers in France
The National Assembly has begun examining the bill on the simplification of economic life. Through its Article 15, this “simplification” bill (or PLS) aims to speed up the construction of huge data centers in France, by allowing the government to impose them on the...
Simplification’ law: stop the data center boom!
Today sees the start of the plenary debate of the draft law on the simplification of economic life at the French National Assembly. A seemingly technical law, with obscure issues, it marks a new show of force in the service of industry, and to the detriment of human...
General mobilisation against the legalisation of algorithmic video surveillance!
During the end of year holidays, and without fanfare, the government prepared the introduction of a new legislation regarding the 2024 Olympic and Paralympic games. As expected, this draft law pave the way for the generalization of algorithmic video surveillance....