I am an interdisciplinary researcher and doctoral candidate at the University of California, Berkeley.  I write in the areas of privacy law, organizations, information, and legal institutions.

Previously, I worked as an attorney for the Federal Trade Commission.  I have a J.D. from the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law, and an A.B., magna cum laude, from Harvard College.  After law school, I clerked for the Honorable Deborah L. Cook of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit and the Honorable Nancy F. Atlas of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas. 

CURRENT RESEARCH

My dissertation examines how technology companies process search warrants, subpoenas, and other legal process requests, and their impact on legal institutions.

I am currently interviewing law enforcement agents, as well as legal, compliance, operations, engineering, and security professionals, about their current or past work with such requests.

If you’re interested in learning more, please reach out to me at yfang@berkeley.edu, or via Twitter and LinkedIn.  I would value the chance to speak with you, whether as part of an interview or informal conversation. 

INTERVIEW PROCESS

Interviews usually take place over video conference or phone, last about one hour, and center on participants' career background and work with legal process requests.

Protecting the identity of participants is of utmost importance to me.  To that end, all information shared during interviews will be handled as confidentially as possible.  For example, I will create pseudonyms for individual participants and organizations.  I will also omit or alter potentially identifying information in some cases.  Overall, I am interested in broad patterns, rather than what particular individuals or organizations do.  I do not need to know confidential details of participants’ work.

CONTACT

Email:  yfang@berkeley.edu

Twitter:  @yan_fang_

LinkedIn:  www.linkedin.com/in/yanfang

PUBLICATIONS

Conversations in Law and Society: Oral Histories of the Emergence and Transformation of the Movement, 16 Annu. Rev. Law. Soc. Sci. 97 (2020) (with Calvin Morrill, Lauren Edelman, and Rosann Greenspan)

FTC Privacy and Data Security Enforcement and Guidance Under Section 5, 25:2 Competition 89 (2016) (with Alexander Reicher)

The Death of the Privacy Policy? Effective Disclosures after In re Sears, Note, 25 Berkeley Tech. L.J. 671 (2010)

CV

Available here.