Why defining cybersecurity is hard for the law and for everyone else | Interdisciplinary Lunch Series

Date/Time
Date(s) - 02/02/2018
12:30 pm - 1:45 pm

On Friday, Feb. 2, the UNC Center for Media Law and Policy will host an interdisciplinary lunch open to faculty and graduate students from across the UNC system with Joseph E. Kennedy, Martha Brandis Term Professor of Law at the UNC School of Law. Professor Kennedy will lead a discussion about the rapidly evolving field of cybersecurity.

As the U.S. Department of Homeland Security warns, “Our daily life, economic vitality, and national security depend on a stable, safe, and resilient cyberspace.”  Despite continuing efforts to improve the security of our computer networks, they remain vulnerable to a wide range of risks stemming from both physical and cyber threats and hazards. Professor Kennedy will discuss some of these risks and what role the law plays in addressing cybersecurity issues.

Professor Kennedy teaches Criminal Law, Criminal Procedure Investigation, Computer Crime Law, Criminal Justice Policy, Constitutional Law, and International and Comparative Criminal Law at UNC Law. His research interests include the sociology and politics of mass incarceration, criminal law, and cybersecurity law.

Professor Kennedy’s scholarly writings have been published in the Georgetown Law Journal, Michigan Law Review, Harvard Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review, the Journal of Law and Contemporary Problems, Emory Law Journal and the Hastings Law Review. He has also presented his scholarly work at Harvard Law School, Stanford Law School, Yale Law School, the University College Dublin and the Annual Meetings of the Association of American Law Schools, Law and Society, the American Society of Criminology and the International Congress of Law and Mental Health.  Professor Kennedy’s article, Monstrous Offenders and the Search for Solidarity Through Modern Punishment, was selected for publication in Criminal Law Conversations, a collection of seminal criminal law articles published in 2009 by Oxford University Press. His article on the connection between mental states in regulatory crimes and the federal sentencing guidelines was selected as best criminal law paper for the Stanford Yale Junior Faculty forum in 2002, and he was the recipient of a Pogue Research Leave at UNC in 2003 and an Ethics Fellowship at UNC’s Institute of Arts and Humanities in 2004. Professor Kennedy also comments regularly on criminal justice and ethical issues of public concern. He has published opinion editorials with Slate Magazine and the Raleigh News and Observer, and has appeared as a media commentator on CBS Evening News, NBC Nightly News, Fox Weekend Live, National Public Radio, Court TV and a number of local radio and television stations.

The Center will provide lunch to those who register by emailing rachael_jones@unc.edu by Wednesday, Jan. 31.