Ryan Calo

  • Lane Powell & D. Wayne Gittinger Professor of Law

Contact

Phone: (206) 543-1580
Email: rcalo@uw.edu

Education

J.D. 2005, University of Michigan B.A., Dartmouth College

Areas of Expertise

Law and Technology 鈥 Privacy 鈥 Artificial Intelligence 鈥 Robotics

Recent Courses

Course Number Course Name
Torts

Selected Publications

See the full list under the Publications tab below.

Ryan Calo is the Lane Powell and D. Wayne Gittinger Professor at the 红桃视频.聽He is a founding co-director (with Batya Friedman and Tadayoshi Kohno) of the interdisciplinary UW Tech Policy Lab and a co-founder (with Chris Coward, Emma Spiro, Kate Starbird, and Jevin West) of the UW Center for an Informed Public. Professor Calo holds a joint appointment at the Information School and an adjunct appointment at the Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science and Engineering.

Professor Calo's research on law and emerging technology appears in leading law reviews (California Law Review, Columbia Law Review, Duke Law Journal, UCLA Law Review, and University of Chicago Law Review)聽and technical publications (MIT Press, Nature, Artificial Intelligence) and is frequently referenced by the national media. His work has been translated into at least four languages. Professor Calo has testified four times before the United States Senate, most recently providing witness testimony on July 11, 2024, before the United States Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation at a hearing titled 鈥淭he Need to Protect Americans鈥 Privacy and the AI Accelerant.鈥 Professor Calo stressed the importance of a comprehensive federal privacy law that both protects Americans鈥 personal privacy and sets guidelines for businesses developing and implementing AI technology.

He has聽organized events on behalf of the National Science Foundation, the National Academy of Sciences, and the Obama White House. He has been a speaker at President Obama's Frontiers Conference, the Aspen Ideas Festival, and聽NPR's Weekend in Washington.

Professor Calo is a board member of the R Street Institute and an affiliate scholar at the Stanford Law School Center for Internet and Society (CIS), where he was a research fellow, and the Yale Law School Information Society Project (ISP). He serves on numerous advisory boards and steering committees, including University of California's People and Robots Initiative, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT), the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), Without My Consent, the Foundation for Responsible Robotics, and the Future of Privacy Forum. In 2011, Professor Calo co-founded the premiere North American annual robotics law and policy conference We Robot with Michael Froomkin and Ian Kerr.

Professor Calo worked as an associate in the Washington, D.C. office of Covington & Burling LLP and clerked for the Honorable R. Guy Cole, the Chief Justice of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. Prior to law school at the University of Michigan, Professor Calo investigated allegations of police misconduct in New York City. He holds a B.A. in Philosophy from Dartmouth College.

Professor Calo won the Phillip A. Trautman 1L Professor of the Year Award in 2014 and 2017 and was awarded the Washington Law Review Faculty Award in 2019.

Research at the Tech Policy Lab is driven exclusively by faculty interest. The Tech Policy Lab seeks to produce impartial research and educational materials around technology policy. Given this goal, the Tech Policy Lab does not take research money from corporations or other private donors with strings attached. All private donors freely agree to give funds as unrestricted gifts, for which there is no contractual agreement and no promised products, results, or deliverables of any kind. Government and foundation grants also follow appropriate protocols to ensure neutrality. To see our sources of funding, visit聽.

Peer Reviewed Journals & Law Reviews

  • Ryan Calo, Artificial Intelligence Policy: A Primer and Roadmap, 51 UC Davis L. Rev. 399-435 (2017).
  • Ryan Calo, Privacy Harm Exceptionalism, 12 Colo. Tech. L. J. 361-64 (2014) (invited).
  • M. Ryan Calo, Note, Scylla or Charybdis: Navigating the Jurisprudence of Visual Clutter, 103 Mich. L. Rev. 1877-98 (2005).

Books or Treatises

  • Robot Law II (Ryan Calo, Michael Froomkin & Kristen Thomasen, eds., Edward Elgar Publishing forthcoming ).
  • Ryan Calo, Law and Technology: A Methodical Approach (Oxford University Press forthcoming).

Book Chapters

  • Ryan Calo, Law Controlling Technology, in Living Together (Joshua Hall & Alice Kassens, eds., Institute for Humane Studies 2022).
  • Ryan Calo, Robotica in Context: An Introduction to the Commentaries, in Ronald K.L. Collins & David M. Skover, Robotica: Speech Rights and Artificial Intelligence 71-74 (Cambridge Univ. Press 2018).

Professional Publications


Other Publications

  • M. Ryan Calo, Peeping Hals, 175 Artificial Intelligence 940-41 (2011).

  • Speaker, "Enlisting Big Data in the Fight Against Coronavirus," (Paper Hearing), U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation (April 9, 2020)
  • Speaker, "Big Data, Big Decisions," with Mary Fan, Spring Judicial Education Program, Washington State Appellate Judges (March 27, 2019)
  • Closing Keynote, Inclusive AI: Technology and Policy for a Diverse Urban Future, University of California--Santa Cruz, Center for Information Technology Research in the Interest of Society, Banatao Institute, and Microsoft (May 10, 2017)
  • Speaker, "Technology as the Game Changer for Data Protection," with Michael Cockrill and Emily McReynolds, Start with Privacy Conference, Washington State Office of Privacy and Data Protection (February 3, 2017)
  • Speaker, Exploring Augmented Reality: Hearing, U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation (November 16, 2016)
  • Speaker, The Bundestag (German Parliament), Committee on the Digital Agenda (June 22, 2016)
  • Moderator, Artificial Intelligence: Law and Policy, The White House and the 红桃视频, Tech Policy Lab (May 24, 2016)
  • Speaker, with Ed Felten, Artificial Intelligence: Law and Policy, The White House and the 红桃视频, Tech Policy Lab (May 24, 2016)
  • Keynote, "Beyond IRBs: Designing Ethical Review Processes for Big Data Research," Future of Privacy Forum, (December 10, 2015)
  • Panelist, "The Implications of Open Data," Conference on Responsible Use of Open Data: Government and the Private Sector, New York University Law School (November 20, 2015)
  • Speaker, "Robotics and the Lessons of Cyberlaw," Faculty Colloquium, Duke Law School (October 9, 2015)
  • Speaker, 2015 Engineering Lecture Series, University of Washington (October 3, 2015)
  • Speaker, "The Surveillance Paradox," Law Review Symposium--National Security: The Impact of Technology on Separation of Powers, University of Chicago Law School (June 19, 2015)
  • Speaker, "Listening Machines," Microsoft Research and New York Times R&D Lab Summit, (June 11, 2015)
  • Speaker, "Privacy and Markets: A Love Story," 8th Annual Privacy Law Scholars Conference, (June 4, 2015)
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