On privacy and technology with Dan Solove

03/14/25 • 47 min

Privacy law and technological advancements have a deep and intertwined history that go back to at least the 1890s with Samuel Warren and Louis Brandeis's article "The Right to Privacy," which was prompted by camera technology.

George Washington University Law Professor Dan Solove has long studied and written about privacy law. He published several well-known books including "Nothing to Hide: The False Trade Off Between Privacy and Security" and co-authored "Privacy Law Fundamentals," which is published by the IAPP.

Solove recently published a new book, "On Privacy and Technology." IAPP Editorial Director Jedidiah Bracy caught up with Solove just before the book was published to discuss it and whether the regulation-versus-innovation trade-off is a fallacy, why the notice-and-choice paradigm hasn't worked for consumers, and where the future will take privacy, AI, and cybersecurity law and regulation.

Previous Episode

Regulating online safety: A chat with Australia eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman-Grant

Australia made waves in 2024 after it passed an amendment to the Online Safety Act of 2021, which introduces a legal minimum age of 16 to create and use an account for certain social media platforms in Australia. It also requires platforms within scope to implement age-gating practices.

As Australia’s first eSafety Commissioner, Julie Inman-Grant, whose agency administers the Online Safety Act and the Social Media Minimum Age amendment, has been at the forefront of regulating online safety since her appointment in 2017. With a background in the private sector, including stints at Microsoft, Twitter and Adobe, Inman-Grant has a wide-ranging view of the online space and the harms within it.

IAPP Editorial Director Jedidiah Bracy recently caught up with Commissioner Inman-Grant to discuss her work in online safety, what’s currently underway regarding age-gating requirements for social media and the effects AI will have for online safety and harms.

Next Episode

Privacy in the age of robotics: A discussion with Erin Relford

Autonomous robots with embedded artificial intelligence are growing more common across industry sectors. So-called “embodied AI,” collects vast amounts of data through its sensors and changes how humans interact with technology.

As embodied AI becomes more common and continues to drive innovation, it also creates new challenges for ethical uses of data and personal privacy.

Erin Relford is a privacy engineer at Google and has worked in the embodied AI space. In a recent article for the IAPP, she wrote that “existing privacy mitigations may be insufficient for human-robot interactions.” That’s why she helped create a robotics privacy framework to “promote privacy-preserving design” in the “responsible deployment of robotics with embedded AI.

IAPP Editorial Director Jedidiah Bracy caught up with Erin to discuss her work in this vanguard space.