Privacy & Security

VIDEO & PODCAST: How and why adults should not (or should) share information about kids and teens through digital technologies More

Insight for Attorney Generals into privacy and emerging technologies More

PODCAST & VIDEO: The dominant model for regulating privacy focuses on giving people control over their information and regulating data practices. This focus ignores the role that… More

Should Facebook be considered an “information fiduciary” when it comes to the privacy of its clients? More

VIDEO & PODCAST: Why technology is not an end in itself, and how cities can be “smart enough,” using technology to promote democracy and equity. More

"Don't Panic: Making Progress on the 'Going Dark' Debate" now in Portuguese after translation by ITS Rio More

Dragana's work is committed to "de-colonizing the net" and helping to empower communities worldwide in overcoming language and cultural barriers on the Internet. More

McNealy is researching surveillance literacy and anti-surveillance tactics and advocacy in marginalized groups More

On building small scale networks of women in technology for social transformation More

Rachel Han is a 2018-2019 Berkman Klein fellow and Director of Business Development at OpenDataSoft, where she focuses on IoT and smart cities initiatives as well as collaborating… More

This primer aims to provide a foundation that can guide future decisions when analyzing and sharing statistical data about individuals, informing individuals about the privacy… More

How have different technical and normative conceptions of privacy evolved? What are the practical challenges that these divergent approaches pose? More

Video & Podcast: Universities produce and consume vast amounts of data for research, teaching, service, and operational purposes. While extremely valuable to universities and… More

VIDEO & PODCAST: Bruce Schneier on his new book "Click Here to Kill Everybody" More

When data from all aspects of our lives can be relevant to our health - from our habits at the grocery store and our Google searches to our FitBit data and our medical records -… More

A look at the gaps that exist between how privacy risks are conceptualized between the fields of law and computer science More

Any evaluation of algorithmic fairness must consider a counterfactual analysis of the effects that algorithmic design, implementation, and use have on the well-being of… More

Join founding members of the CryptoKitties team, Dieter Shirley and Alex Shih, as they discuss the unique governance, legal, and regulatory challenges of putting cats on the… More

This paper explores the potential international ripple effects that can occur following changes to domestic encryption policies. More

When do Harvard law students perceive digital file sharing (and piracy) as fine? More

Jennifer E. Rothman discusses her book, The Right of Publicity: Privacy Reimagined for a Public World (Harvard University Press 2018). She challenges the conventional story of the… More

This article analyzes how privacy risks multiply as large quantities of personal data are collected over longer periods of time. More

Join us at the University of Michigan for a discussion with Eric Gilbert, Cedric Langbort, Jeff Larson, Casey Pierce, and Christo Wilson on how researchers can navigate and… More

A brief primer on how cross-border data access requests currently work, options for reform, and major challenges to reform ahead. More

An inside look at the challenges facing women, human rights defenders, and other internet users in Pakistan, from online harassment to privacy and free expression. More

For hospitals and healthcare providers, data protection efforts have long been driven by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. This talk will look at recent… More

Mobile phone data are providing unprecedented insights into human migration and behavior with relevance for containment of epidemics and response to natural disasters, but what… More

This guide provides a practical starting point for companies that want to create or improve their transparency reports. More

The Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University is excited to announce that it is one of nine winners of the “6th Digital Media and Learning (DML)… More

This research briefing builds upon student privacy research and activities, and aims to translate these into practical take-aways.  More

This research briefing offers a snapshot of recent developments in the open data and privacy landscape, outlines an action map of various governance approaches to protecting… More

This research briefing aims to translate findings from ongoing Berkman Klein Center privacy and cybersecurity research and activities into practical considerations and takeaways… More

Harvard Law School’s Cyberlaw Clinic, based at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society, has prepared this guide to provide a high-level overview of two of the major federal… More

Governments are under increasing pressure to promote transparency, accountability, and innovation by making the data they hold available to the public. Because the data often… More

The student-moderated discussion among invited experts focused on bringing data privacy from theory to reality, and included a close look at the strengths and flaws of the current… More

The Berkman Center is pleased to announce the publication of a new paper from the Privacy Tools for Sharing Research Data project team. In this paper, Effy Vayena, Urs Gasser,… More

This paper describes how the fractal complexity of cloud computing’s physical geography has fractured the system of Mutual Legal Assistance Treaties (MLATs) that arose during the… More

In this paper, which is modeled on a similar effort in 1999 by researchers from George Washington University, Berkman Fellow Bruce Schneier and collaborator Kathleen Seidel… More

This report from the Berkman Center's Berklett Cybersecurity Project offers a new perspective on the "going dark" debate from the discussion, debate, and analyses of an… More

The Berkman Center and Youth and Media are pleased to announce the launch of the Digital Literacy Resource Platform (DLRP), a new online platform we have designed and incubated as… More

On January 6, 2016, members of the Privacy Tools for Sharing Research Data project submitted comments in response to the September 2015 notice of proposed rulemaking to revise the… More

In this report, which was published in PLOS Medicine, the authors examine the questions around access to genomic data. They argue that the real breakthrough in reconciling privacy… More

The Berkman Center’s Student Privacy Initiative will be taking stock of our student privacy work to date and exploring future directions. At this luncheon, the Berkman team will… More

Can lawyers and computer scientists bridge their very different notions of privacy? More

Join us to learn more about the methodology and findings behind The Mozilla Delphi Cybersecurity study. More

Building off several prior working meetings which mapped and considered the implications of the new and rapidly evolving ecosystem of networked technology being used with… More

“Digitally Connected: Global Perspectives on Youth and Digital Media,” is a first-of-its kind collection of essays that offers reflections from diverse perspectives on youth… More

This workshop report, the second in a series, identifies selected questions and explores issues around the meaning of “public” in the context of using data about individuals for… More

In Data and Goliath, security expert Bruce Schneier offers another path, one that values both security and privacy. He shows us exactly what we can do to reform our government… More

Youth and Media is pleased to announce the publication of "Youth and Online News: Reflections and Perspectives," a series of short essays written by friends and colleagues that… More

The Internet Monitor project's second annual report—Internet Monitor 2014: Reflections on the Digital World—is a collection of roughly three dozen short contributions that… More

This paper explores interdisciplinary approaches to privacy in long-term longitudinal studies of human subjects. Long-term longitudinal studies collect, at multiple points over a… More

The Berkman Center’s Student Privacy Initiative team presents a snapshot of K-12 cloud-based ed tech and student privacy in early 2014 before turning to pragmatic law and policy… More

This paper provides a snapshot of key aspects of a diverse—and heated—law, policy, and implementation debate that is taking place in the rapidly evolving cloud-based ed tech… More

This research brief, prepared by the Berkman Center’s Youth and Media project for the co-organized Berkman Center and Consortium for School Networking working meeting on student… More

This report offers recommended next steps and prioritized open issues in the K-12 educational technology (edtech) space, with a special emphasis on two topics: (1) law and policy… More

Created for and informed by the co-organized Berkman Center and Consortium for School Networking working meeting on November 19, 2013, this document aims to provide individuals… More

Internet Monitor 2013: Reflections on the Digital World, the Internet Monitor project's first-ever annual report, is a collection of essays from roughly two dozen experts around… More

58% of American teens have downloaded an app to a cell phone or tablet. More than half of teen apps users have avoided an app due to concerns about sharing their personal… More

Many teens ages 12-17 report that they usually figure out how to manage content sharing and privacy settings on their own. Focus group interviews with teens suggest that for their… More

Senator Richard Blumenthal will deliver an address about proposed legislation to reform the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. Read more about the legislation > More

Teens are sharing more information about themselves on social media sites than they have in the past, but they are also taking a variety of technical and non-technical steps to… More

Smartphone adoption among American teens has increased substantially and mobile access to the internet is pervasive. One in four teens are “cell-mostly” internet users, who say… More

Parents have a range of concerns about how their children’s online activities might affect their privacy and many have taken steps to monitor their children and encourage online… More

This research update presents an aggregation and summary of recent academic literature on youth bullying. The purpose of this document is to “translate” scholarly research for a… More

Building upon a process- and context-oriented information quality framework, this paper seeks to map and explore what we know about the ways in which young users of age 18 and… More

The recent surge in digital activism that has helped to shape the Arab spring has been met with stiff resistance by governments in the region intent on reducing the impact of… More

This paper evaluates the usage of blocking-resistant circumvention tools, simple web proxies, and VPN services and finds that overall usage of circumvention tools is still very… More

This document addresses legal and practical issues related to the practice colloquially known as sexting. It was created by Harvard Law School’s Cyberlaw Clinic, based at the… More

This paper's main objectives are: to raise awareness about issues related to digital safety for youth in developing nations; to provide a tentative map of these issues and give… More

Statement by danah boyd, Urs Gasser, and John Palfrey, urging consideration of the gap between the intentions of COPPA and how children and their parents perceive its… More

The scope of this literature review is to map out what is currently understood about the intersections of youth, reputation, and privacy online, focusing on youth attitudes and… More

The response synthesizes current research and data on the media practices of youth, focusing on three main areas -- 1) Risky Behaviors and Online Safety, 2) Privacy, Publicity and… More

This paper describes research findings that show young people operate in the digital realm overwhelmingly ignorant of the rights, and to a lesser degree the restrictions,… More

A large variety of different projects have developed tools that can be used to circumvent Internet filtering, allowing people in filtered countries access to otherwise filtered… More

In the twenty-first century, a state can come to know more about each of its citizens via surveillance than ever before in human history. Some states are beginning to exercise… More

Google's AdWords system serves ads alongside about a quarter of all web traffic. In the process of serving those ads, Google actively processes the user browsing data in order to… More

The Berkman Center celebrated the release of John Palfrey and Urs Gasser's "Born Digital: Understanding the First Generation of Digital Natives" at Harvard Law School. More

Based on original research and advancing new theories, leading internet and technology experts John Palfrey and Urs Gasser offer a sociological portrait of the 'Born Digital'… More