Tech Policy Press

Woodrow Hartzog is interviewed on the Tech Policy Press Podcast about his recent paper, written with Daniel Solove, exploring the novelist Franz Kafka’s worldview as a vehicle to arrive at key insights for regulating privacy in the age of AI. 

The conversation explores why privacy-as-control models, which rely on individual consent and choice, fail in the digital age, especially with the advent of AI systems. Hartzog argues for a "societal structure model" of privacy protection that would impose substantive obligations on companies and set baseline protections for everyone rather than relying on individual consent. Kafka's work is a lens to examine how people often make choices against their own interests when confronted with complex technological systems, and how AI is amplifying these existing privacy and control problems.

International privacy expert Woodrow Hartzog discusses the state of AI regulation in the U.S., his thoughts on the global dynamics at play, and his concerns surrounding the normalization of surveillance and our reliance on half-measures to save us from the potential harms of AI. Listen to the conversation on the Canadian Bar Association’s Modern Law podcast.

Every day, Internet users interact with technologies designed to undermine their privacy. Social media apps, surveillance technologies, and the Internet of Things are all built in ways that make it hard to guard personal information. And the law says this is okay because it is up to users to protect themselves―even when the odds are deliberately stacked against them.

Jake Chanenson interviews Woodrow Hartzog as they discuss his book, Privacy’s Blueprint: The Battle to Control the Design of New Technologies, and ways in which the law can demand that technology be made worthy of our trust.

Digital connections permeate our lives-and so do data breaches. Given that we must be online for basic communication, finance, healthcare, and more, it is alarming how difficult it is to create rules for securing our personal information. Despite the passage of many data security laws, data breaches are increasing at a record pace. In Breached! Why Data Security Law Fails and How to Improve It (Oxford UP, 2022), Daniel Solove and Woodrow Hartzog, two of the world's leading experts on privacy and data security, argue that the law fails because, ironically, it focuses too much on the breach itself. They discuss this and more on Exchanges: A Cambridge Up Podcast.

Woodrow Hartzog, (then)  a professor at Northeastern University Law School, discusses Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s agreement to appear before the House Energy and Commerce Committee about the company's data usage policies. He speaks with Bloomberg's June Grasso. Listen to the conversation on the Bloomberg Law podcast.