This past weekend, we lost one of the worlds most noble technologists, Peter Eckersley. Peter and I regularly collaborated when I was working on HTTPS and privacy at Mozilla, and he worked enthusiastically and tirelessly to hold everyone to a higher standard than even himself. He was instrumental in many of the EFF's projects like PrivacyBadger, Panopticlick, and HTTPS Everywhere, while he nudged the Mozilla contributors to keep working on privacy and HTTPS; but possibly his biggest contributions were his work on CertBot and LetsEncrypt.
He didn't do this alone. He was a leader, a technical idealist who captured people who often disagreed with him and channeled their energy to make the web safer.
When you use a web browser, the odds are good that Peter's influence has helped secure the bits you're transferring from a server or to protect you from surveillance. If you believe information should be free, your data is yours, and everyone should have secure messaging, please consider how you can help empower the everyday person to resist surveillance online. He fought the good fight but met an adversary that took him away from his work far too early. He was 43. I will miss you, pde.
