Doreen Fadaeiforghan
Class of 2023
Law
Privacy and intellectual property
Involvement
I am from Iran, so naturally, I raise awareness about the issues and humanitarian crises in the Middle East. When the first women-led revolution took place in Iran, I gathered a group of friends to have a teach-in panel to create awareness of this important event. Fortunately, the event was a success, and we received great feedback. I was also the project director of the International Refugee Assistance Program (IRAP) for two years. In that capacity, a pro bono counsel and I led the team to research and present at the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees on immigration visas and paths to citizenship. I also founded the Space Law Society with a group of my friends. We had a successful panel on space law (an unknown but exciting area) and added a space law class.
Passion
The United Nations declared privacy as a human right. However, we increasingly see this right disappear as technology evolves. We see citizens of counties like China, Iran, and Russia have close to zero expectations of privacy. Even in the U.S., privacy is not much of a right but a privilege of citizens willing to pay for it. On the other hand, technology is essential to the future of all societies. Still, to live alongside such rapid phenomena, we must protect individual privacy to prevent powerful interests from using our data in ways that violate citizens’ rights, such as voter suppression, racial targeting, and many other biases in corporate algorithms. This is why I am passionate about privacy law and the complex relationship between privacy and technology.