Banking institutions have sought to automate customer service throughwebsites and, more recently, through TRApps.
https://www.fsfla.org/anuncio/2023-03-TRApps
What these banks are saving in offices and staff, we customers arepaying for with security and freedom. They are morally bankrupt.
Genuine security never depends on secret software. On the contrary,transparency strengthens security.
Nevertheless, these banks impose on us, in the name of security (theirown, not ours), various harmful behaviors:
the use of software that we cannot control and whose actions on ourcomputers are hidden from us;
the use of too-short passwords; and
the use of devices and operating systems designed to run undersomeone else's control, and to collect and exfiltrate our data.
Running software controlled by others always implies a loss offreedom, and a threat to security and privacy.
The requirement to use these programs has become so common andpersistent that it seems unavoidable. Thus, we have decided to expandour campaign against imposed taxing software beyond state-controlledinstitutions to also include private services and goods whoseproviders converge on such impositions.
https://www.fsfla.org/anuncio/2023-04-bancarrota#softimp
We share our board member Alexandre Oliva's recent account of his over20 years of struggle against technological abuse by banks in hiscountry. We highlight his recent legal victory: online bankingservices must be restored without requiring the installation ofprograms other than a standard browser. Read more:
https://www.fsfla.org/texto/bancarrota
Since 2006, we have been running a campaign against imposed taxingsoftware: programs that are imposed in the sense that you cannot avoidthem, and taxing in the sense that they burden you in a way thatresembles a tax, but is exempt from social benefits and paid for withyour freedom.
Nonfree programs are unjust and too onerous (even when they arenominally gratis), because they imply a loss of freedom, that is, ofcontrol over your digital life. When this burden (of suppressedfreedom) is compounded with the imposition of use of such programs,they become profoundly oppressive: imposed taxing software.
Our initial focus was on oppressive software imposed by governments,such as mandatory tax-related programs and software required tointeract with public banks.
https://www.fsfla.org/circular/2006-11#Editorial
While pressuring the government to liberate income tax software inBrazil, we have been updating and publishing a compatible andfreedom-respecting version every year since 2007.
https://www.fsfla.org/anuncio/2012-10-Acesso-SoftImp
https://www.fsfla.org/~lxoliva/fsfla/irpf-livre/
In 2023, we extended the campaign to taxing software imposed byprivate providers: when freedom-depriving software is required toobtain or enjoy products or services.
To be clear, this campaign is not (solely) about software fortaxation, but rather about software that is taxing (an unjust burden,because it taxes your freedom; the software is itself like a tax), andthat, on top of that, is imposed, thus profoundly oppressive.
Free Software Foundation Latin America joined in 2005 theinternational FSF network, previously formed by Free SoftwareFoundations in the United States, in Europe and in India. Thesesister organizations work in their corresponding geographies towardspromoting the same Free Software ideals and defending the samefreedoms for software users and developers, working locally butcooperating globally.
https://www.fsfla.org/
Copyright 2023 FSFLA
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