Ryan Calo

Ryan Calo is an assistant professor at the University of Washington School of Law and a former research director at CIS. A nationally recognized expert in law and emerging technology, Ryan's work has appeared in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, NPR, Wired Magazine, and other news outlets. Ryan serves on several advisory committees, including the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the Electronic Privacy Information Center, and the Future of Privacy Forum. He co-chairs the American Bar Association Committee on Robotics and Artificial Intelligence and serves on the program committee of National Robotics Week.

You can read Ryan's work on SSRN and follow him on Twitter.

Two Serious Problems With GPS-Aided Car Repossession

By Ryan Calo • December 16, 2008 at 10:51 am

A recent Computerworld blog post shows how tone deaf we can be about the implications of new technology. A group of car dealers in Oregon apparently attached GPS devices to cars sold to customers with poor credit so as to be able to track them down more easily in the event of repossession. Read more » about Two Serious Problems With GPS-Aided Car Repossession

My Buddies App On Facebook: Privacy Extortion?

By Ryan Calo • December 13, 2008 at 10:02 pm

UPDATE (Dec. 14, 2008): A user has created a Facebook Group against My Buddies. Meanwhile, as Beth says below, My Buddies has mutated into My Friends...

I recently received a series of notifications on Facebook alerting me that friends of mine had answered various personal questions about me. One notification claimed that a high school friend had just answered a specific yes/no question about my sexual orientation. Clicking on the link labeled “What did she say?”, I was invited to join My Buddies – a new Facebook application with an icon identical to the default running man on AIM, implying a connection to AOL that I doubt exists. Read more » about My Buddies App On Facebook: Privacy Extortion?

Search Terms May Bolster Case Against Casey Anthony

By Ryan Calo • November 26, 2008 at 12:12 pm

The United Press International reports that "[n]ewly released documents in Florida's Caylee Anthony case show ominous search words entered on the family computer prior to the child's disappearance." Some thoughts:

1. I've yet to see an investigation wherein the search terms at issue came from the service provider (e.g., Google or Yahoo!). Rather, they appear to be taken from the defendant's computer pursuant to a warrant.

2. I think the introduction of search terms into evidence presents a real danger in the context of inchoate crimes such as attempted murder. Searches can be snapshots of a person's mind, but no more than that. The concern is that a jury will see concrete intentions in Internet searches and not require a showing of a firm will to go through with the crime.

3. As Search Engine Watch points out, searches can lead to convictions in another way -- by allowing citizens to make connections and report them to the police. In one case, a Florida woman reported a man for practicing medicine without a license after an Internet search revealed that his license had been revoked.

4. Why is it always Florida? Read more » about Search Terms May Bolster Case Against Casey Anthony

Obama’s Tech Team: Agency Insiders With Silicon Valleyues

By Ryan Calo • November 25, 2008 at 4:26 pm

A Washington Post tech blogger reports that President-elect Barak Obama has named a team to guide technology policy for the administration: Julius Genachowski (former chief counsel to FCC Chairman Reed Hundt, former senior executive at IAC), Sonal Shah (head of global development at Google.org) and Blair Levin (telecommunications policy analyst and consultant). Previous appointments around tech policy include Susan Crawford (Michigan Law School) and Kevin Wernach (World of Wharton), recently named to Obama’s FCC transition team, with more appointments to follow. Obama appears to be striking the right balance between academics, policy wonks, and practitioners. He has hired former insiders who also appear to have the right “Silicon Valleyues” of innovation and openness. Read more » about Obama’s Tech Team: Agency Insiders With Silicon Valleyues

Navigenics And 23andMe Commit To Fight Unreasonable Subpoenas

By Ryan Calo • November 11, 2008 at 4:01 pm

I learned something very interesting in preparing for last evening’s panel (PDF) on consumer genomics we recently co-sponsored with the Center for Law and the Biosciences. It turns out that at least one industry leader – Navigenics – has committed in writing to resisting court orders, subpoenas, and other requests for information about their customers. Specifically, Navigenics promises in its privacy policy that the company “will use reasonable and lawful efforts to limit the scope of any such legally required disclosure.”

I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a commitment to push back against third-party requests in a public legal document before. And the 23andMe panelist's commitment, though oral, was at least as strong. Read more » about Navigenics And 23andMe Commit To Fight Unreasonable Subpoenas

Ryan Calo

Driverless Car Summit

Vehicle Automation: TRB @ Stanford

52nd Annual Workshop on Transportation Law

Big Data and Privacy: Making Ends Meet

Ryan Calo

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