Menu Close

Daniel Weitzner

Daniel Weitzner

weitzner-head-shot
Daniel serves on the International Digital Accountability Council (IDAC) Board of Directors.

Daniel J. Weitzner is Founding Director of the MIT Internet Policy Research Initiative,
Principal Research Scientist at CSAIL, and teaches Internet public policy in MIT’s Electrical
Engineering and Computer Science Department. Weitzner’s research pioneered the
development of Accountable Systems to enable computational treatment of legal rules.
Weitzner was United States Deputy Chief Technology Officer for Internet Policy in the
White House. where he led initiatives on privacy, cybersecurity, copyright, and digital
trade policies promoting the free flow of information. He was responsible for the Obama
Administration’s Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights and the OECD Internet Policymaking
Principles.

Weitzner has been a leader in Internet public policy from its inception, making
fundamental contributions to the successful fight for strong online free expression
protection in the United States Supreme Court, and for laws that control government
surveillance of email and web browsing data.

Weitzner has a law degree from Buffalo Law School, and a B.A. in Philosophy from
Swarthmore College. His writings have appeared in Science magazine, the Yale Law
Review, Communications of the ACM, the Washington Post, Wired Magazine and Social
Research.

Weitzner is a founder of the Center for Democracy and Technology, led the World Wide
Web Consortium’s public policy activities, and was Deputy Policy Director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation. He is a Fellow of the National Academy of Public Administration, recipient of the International Association of Privacy Professionals Leadership Award (2013), the Electronic Frontier Foundation Pioneer Award (2016), a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and a Senior Fellow at the German Marshall Fund.