Law School Promotes Cyber Privacy Expert

Harvard Law School (HLS) assistant professor Jonathan Zittrain, a cyber law expert, was named Berkman assistant professor of legal studies at HLS last week.

Zittrain, who joined the law school faculty in 1997, previously served as executive director of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society, a prominent research center on Internet trends, technology and the law, and will remain co-director of the center despite his new appointment.

Zittrain said he is excited about his post, even though it limits his role at the Berkman Center.

"I can't think of any other place I'd want to be, doing anything other than what I am doing right now," Zittrain said.

Zittrain has explored issues such as digital property, privacy and speech in his academic career.

"Jonathan Zittrain is one of the world's foremost Internet and technology scholars," HLS Dean Robert C. Clark said in a press release. "The Harvard community will benefit immeasurably by having such a talented scholar hold the Berkman Professorship."

"He is a superstar teacher and an Internet wizard," said HLS professor Einer R. Elhauge '83.

Zittrain said he is interested in developing ways to use technology in the classroom.

"I'd love to see ways in which technology can bring together people from far away who are looking at the same topics often from many different angles," he said.

Currently, Zittrain said he is studying the issue of Internet privacy. He said that Internet companies like Amazon.com can charge customers different prices for the same product based on information they have collected about the customer. Zittrain said he is studying the legal and social implications of these sales techniques.

Zittrain said cyber law faces a host of challenges as it develops as a field of legal study.

"Cyber law is trying to determine its boundaries and justify its existence," he said. "We shouldn't take it for granted that cyber law should exist."

Zittrain has been interested in cyber issues since childhood. At age 15, Zittrain was the chief forum administrator for the CompuServe Information Service. At 16, he began writing a regular column for Computer Shopper magazine.

"I ran up a $200 bill on my parent's credit card [when I was 13]," Zittrain said. "I was hooked."

While in college at Yale, he created an electronic information service for members of the bar association of Pittsburgh, Penn., his hometown.

In addition to his post at HLS, Zittrain serves on the advisory board of the World Economic Forum. He has also served on the staff of the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and in the State Department.