Please join GW Law's Intellectual Property Law Program's Speaker Series with featured guest Professor Tiffany Li, University of New Hampshire School of Law.

Professor Li will present her paper "Algorithmic Destruction." This paper explores how the contemporary privacy law does not go far enough to protect our privacy interests, particularly where artificial intelligence and machine learning are concerned. Going beyond the well-known problems of algorithmic bias and data deletion, this article introduces the novel concept of the “algorithmic shadow” and explains the new privacy remedy of “algorithmic destruction,” also known as algorithmic disgorgement or machine unlearning. The algorithmic shadow describes the persistent imprint of training data that has been fed into a machine learning model and used to refine that machine learning system. This shadow persists even if data is deleted from the initial training data set, meaning privacy rights like data deletion cannot address the new class of privacy harms that arise from algorithmic shadows. Algorithmic destruction (deletion of models or algorithms trained on misbegotten data) has emerged as an alternative, or perhaps supplementary, remedy and regulatory enforcement tool to combat these new harms. This article considers the theoretical and practical application of algorithmic destruction as a potential right and remedy—addressing its drawbacks and limitations as well as its advantages.

Note: No prior technical understanding is necessary to attend this talk. You will learn everything you need to know about AI and ML, within the hour.*

*Results not guaranteed

Box lunches will be available for in-person attendees. 

There is no registration required for in-person attendance, but non-GW guests should email Ms. Claudia Delgado or Professor Barbara Lauriat for information on accessing the building.

Tiffany Li is an Assistant Professor of Law at the University of New Hampshire School of Law, where she teaches tech and IP law courses. She is also a Fellow at the Yale Law School Information Society Project. Li previously taught for the BU/MIT Technology Law Clinic at the Boston University School of Law and has held past affiliations with Princeton’s Center for Information Technology Policy and U.C. Berkeley’s Center for Technology, Society and Policy. Prior to academia, she gained experience in law and policy working at several leading technology organizations.