Disruptive Technologies Legal Summit 2019

Winston & Strawn LLP, the High Tech Law Institute at Santa Clara University, and the Berkeley Center for Law & Technology hosted their second-annual Disruptive Technologies Legal Summit, a cutting-edge conference on the current legal landscape of artificial intelligence (AI), blockchain, and other emerging and disruptive technologies. This day-long event, featured leading lawyers, academics, and business leaders, explored common legal and regulatory challenges, potential solutions, and strategies for safely and successfully staying at the forefront of this rapidly developing area of law. 

View the full agenda here.

With increased regulation of personally identifiable information, companies that offer new technologies will face new challenges in leveraging data under their purview. This panel discussed how the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), as well as FTC privacy and security enforcement actions and similar laws, may impact the implementation of new technologies.

9:15 a.m. – 10:15 a.m. PST

Moderators:

• Alessandra Swanson, Of Counsel – Winston & Strawn

Panelists:

• Will Cooper, Director of Litigation, Intellectual Property and Privacy – Fortinet
• James Dempsey, Executive Director – Berkeley Center for Law & Technology
• Michael Yang, Vice President and General Counsel – Proofpoint, Inc.

Bitcoin, altcoin, and stable coin have seemingly reached mainstream status since Bitcoin launched 11 years ago. This panel explored digital currency’s impact on the way financial services are and can be delivered and the associated benefits and risks.

10:30 a.m. – 11:40 a.m. PST

Moderator:

• Danielle Williams, Partner – Winston & Strawn

Panelists:

• Ben Adams, Vice President, Legal – PayPal
• Mark duBose, Chief Compliance Officer – Circle
• Angela Jeffers, General Counsel and Chief Compliance Officer – Loansnap
• Pavan Katepalli, Lead Solutions Architect – ConsenSys

Traditional legal and ethical frameworks cannot keep up with the pressing issues raised by artificial intelligence technologies. This panel explored new legal structures—both implemented and proposed—to specifically address issues arising from the use of AI. The panel also explored ethical issues raised by the use of self-learning machines and autonomous systems. 

12:40 p.m. – 1:30 p.m.PST

Moderator:

• Amanda Groves, Partner – Winston & Strawn

Panelists:

• Harry Clarke, Senior Counsel, Head of R&D Legal – Spotify 
• Irina Raicu, Internet Ethics Program Director – Markkula Center for Applied Ethics at Santa Clara University
• Andy Song, General Counsel – Manifold 
• Ash Upreti, Director, Legal, Autonomous Vehicles – Lyft

The antitrust agencies’ announcement of far-reaching investigations of dominant tech firms confirms a new enforcement era is dawning. But what conduct is subject to scrutiny, how far might U.S. enforcement shift, and who else should be concerned? To date, the E.U. has more aggressively pursued antitrust challenges to social media and internet search platforms, and has been more willing to address privacy concerns with antitrust enforcement. Will the U.S. and private plaintiffs follow suit, and how will this impact more emergent tech like AI, blockchain, and fintech?

1:30 p.m. – 2:20 p.m. PST

Moderator:

• Susannah Torpey, Partner – Winston & Strawn

Panelists:

• Matthew Gessesse, Attorney Advisor, Office of Commissioner Rebecca Kelly Slaughter – U.S. Federal Trade Commission
• Michael Wilson, Regional Counsel – IBM
• Dr. Lawrence Wu, President – NERA Economic Consulting

A lively interview with one of our Country’s most active Federal Judges on the front line in Waco, Texas. This panel provided both the judicial and in-house counsel perspective on what we are seeing in court today, including creative measures to disrupt dispute resolution.

2:20 p.m. – 3:10 p.m. PST 

Panelists:

• Judge Alan D Albright, U.S. District Judge for the U.S. District Court, Western District of Texas 
• Brooks Beard, Vice President & Deputy General Counsel – Litigation, Employment, Cybersecurity & Reg. Compliance – VMware

This discussion covered global disruption and the impacts across industries faced by changes in U.S. foreign policy, responses to those changes, and activities of rogue regimes and the criminal element. In particular, we addressed how global corruption in trade and throughout the financial system can impact rule of law focused first on global transparency in supply chains and on the competing focus on data privacy. 

3:30 p.m. – 4:20 p.m. PST

• Cari Stinebower, Partner – Winston & Strawn

We are in the nascent stages of developing a working framework around disruptive technologies. What do the experts see as our biggest challenges and opportunities as we move forward?

Disruptive Technology Legal Resource Hub

Visit Winston’s Disruptive Technology Legal Resource Hub, a one-stop resource for comprehensive legal information related to disruptive technologies.