American activist and attorney
Kevin Stuart Bankston[1] (born July 2, 1974)[2] is an American activist[citation needed] and attorney, who specialized in the areas of free speech and privacy law.[3] He is currently Privacy Policy Director at Facebook, where he leads policy work on AI and emerging technologies.[4] He was formerly the director of the Open Technology Institute (OTI) at the New America Foundation in Washington, D.C.[5]
Education
Bankston earned a BA at the University of Texas at Austin. In 2001 he completed a Juris Doctor at the University of Southern California.[6]
Career
In his early career Bankston served, from 2001 until 2002,[7] as a Justice William J. Brennan First Amendment Fellow for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) in New York City. At the ACLU he litigated Internet-related free speech cases.[6]
He then joined the Electronic Frontier Foundation in 2003 as an Equal Justice Works/Bruce J. Ennis Fellow.[7] From 2003 until 2005 he studied the impact anti-terrorism-related surveillance initiatives had on online privacy and free speech after 9/11. At the EFF he specialized in free speech and privacy law[3] and later became senior staff attorney.[8] In the EFF’s lawsuits against the National Security Agency (NSA) and AT&T where the lawfulness of the NSA’s warrantless wiretapping program was challenged, Bankston was a lead counsel.[6]
After working for almost ten years at the EFF Bankston joined the Center for Democracy & Technology (CDT) in Washington, D.C. in early 2012. As senior counsel and the director of the Free Expression Policy Project[8] he advocated a variety of internet and technology policy issues at the Nonprofit organization.[9] In November 2013 he spoke before the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology and the Law on The Surveillance Transparency Act of 2013.[10]
He later became the director of the Open Technology Institute (OTI) at the New America Foundation in Washington DC.[5]
