Human Rights Claims Against Cisco Can Move Forward (Again)

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Google and Amazon – You Should Take Note of Your Own Aiding and Abetting Risk 

EFF has long pushed companies that provide powerful surveillance tools to governments to take affirmative steps to avoid aiding and abetting human rights abuses. We have also worked to ensure they face consequences when they do not.

Last week, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit helped this cause, by affirming its powerful 2023 decision that aiding and abetting liability in U.S. courts can apply to technology companies that provide sophisticated surveillance systems that are used to facilitate human rights abuses.  

The specific case is against Cisco and arises out of allegations that Cisco custom-built tools as part of the Great Firewall of China to help the Chinese government target members of disfavored groups, including the Falun Gong religious minority.  The case claims that those tools were used to help identify individuals who then faced horrific consequences, including wrongful arrest, detention, torture, and death.  

We did a deep dive analysis of the Ninth Circuit panel decision when it came out in 2023.  Last week, the Ninth Circuit rejected an attempt to have that initial decision reconsidered by the full court, called en banc review. While the case has now survived Ninth Circuit review and should otherwise be able to move forward in the trial court, Cisco has indicated that it intends to file a petition for U.S. Supreme Court

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