The growing ubiquity of algorithms in society: implications, impacts and innovations

Christina studied Jurisprudence at Oxford and qualified as a solicitor in 1991. She has developed and managed law firms including a virtual law firm. In 2011 she set up the Co-operative Legal Services family law offering, later becoming their Director of Policy. She is currently Director of Innovation at top 100 firm Cripps LLP. Christina holds a range of public appointments including member of  the Family Justice Council, trustee of LawWorks and council member for the Women Lawyers Division.  Christina is Vice President of the Law Society of England and Wales and will become President in 2018. She is an award winning published author, speaker and lecturer and frequent media commentator.

Marion Oswald is a Senior Fellow in Law, Solicitor (non-practising) and Head of the Centre for Information Rights at the University of Winchester.  Following a career as an in-house lawyer with international technology companies and the UK Government, she joined the University of Winchester in 2009 establishing the Centre for Information Rights in 2012.  Her research focuses on information technology, privacy and information law.  Recent work includes a collaboration with Durham Constabulary to reflect upon the recent operational deployment of an algorithmic risk assessment tool within the force, and a consultation report relating to the depiction of young children on digital, online and broadcast media.  She is an executive member of the British and Irish Law Education and Technology Association, and sits on the National Statistician's Data Ethics Advisory Committee.

Carl Wiper has worked at the Information Commissioner’s Office since 2010. He is a Group Manager in the Policy and Engagement department at the ICO. He is currently responsible for producing ICO guidance on the GDPR, with a particular focus on profiling, transparency and accountability. He worked on the ICO’s award-winning paper on big data, AI, machine learning and data protection. He has also worked on European-level guidance on profiling and automated decision-making within the EU’s Article 29 Working Party. Before joining the ICO, he was an information manager in local government, and his career has been spent working in information management and research in organisations in the public, private and third sectors.

Mireille Hildebrandt is a lawyer and a philosopher. She is a tenured Research Professor at the Faculty of Law & Criminology of Vrije Universiteit Brussel, on ‘Interfacing Law and Technology’. She also holds a part-time Chair at the Science Faculty of Radboud University Nijmegen, on ‘Smart Environments, Data Protection and the Rule of Law’. Hildebrandt conducts research on the cusp of law, philosophy and technology, more specifically on the implications of artificial intelligence and algorithmic decision-making. She publishes profusely, e.g. her latest books on Smart Technologies and the End(s) of Law (Edward Elgar 2015) and Information, Freedom and Property (Routledge 2016).

Hetan Shah is Executive Director of the Royal Statistical Society, an 8,000 member body with a vision of a world with data at the heart of understanding and decision-making. He is Chair of the Friends Provident Foundation, a grant making trust; and visiting senior research fellow at the Policy Institute, Kings College. He is a member of the IPPR Commission on Economic Justice, and also of the UK Social Metrics Commission.

Chris Reed is Professor of Electronic Commerce Law at the Centre for Commercial Law Studies, Queen Mary University of London, where he was formerly Director of the Centre and subsequently Academic Dean of the Faculty of Law & Social Science. He consults to companies and law firms, having previously been of counsel to the City of London law firms Lawrence Graham, Tite & Lewis and Stephenson Harwood.

Chris has worked exclusively in the computing and technology law field since 1987, and teaches University of London LLM students from all over the world. He has published widely on many aspects of computer law; his latest book is Making Laws for Cyberspace (OUP 2012), he is the editor and part author of Computer Law (7th ed. Oxford University Press 2011), the author of Internet Law (2nd ed. Cambridge University Press 2004), Digital Information Law: electronic documents and requirements of form (Centre for Commercial Law Studies 1996) and Electronic Finance Law (Woodhead Faulkner 1991), and the co-editor of Cross-Border Electronic Banking (2nd ed. Lloyd’s of London Press 2000). Research with which he was involved led to the EU directives on electronic signatures and on electronic commerce. The Leverhulme Foundation awarded him a Major Research Fellowship for 2009-2011 (see Making Laws for Cyberspace for findings).

From 1997 to 2000 Chris was Joint Chairman of the Society for Computers and Law, of which he is an inaugural Honorary Fellow, and in 1997-8 he acted as Specialist Adviser to the House of Lords Select Committee on Science and Technology. Chris has acted as an Expert for the European Commission, represented the UK Government at the Hague Conference on Private International Law and has been an invited speaker at OECD and G8 international conferences.