Advances in algorithmic data processing, cryptography, artificial intelligence, networking, databases, software engineering, and many other fields of computer science have raised difficult legal questions. At the same time, computational methods have shed new light on legal problems in domains ranging from criminal procedure to evidence to intellectual property. These intersections have created a growing need for research that combines deep understanding of the power and the limitations of computing with expertise in multiple aspects of law.

The ACM Symposium on Computer Science and Law is the flagship conference for the emerging field of computer science and law. It brings together a community of scholars, lawyers, and computing professionals who are fluent in both computational thinking (with its rigorous mathematical formalisms) and legal scholarship and thought (with its equally rigorous yet human-centric set of principles, methodologies, and goals). Central to the study of “computer science and law” is the creation of a body of scholarship aimed at the co-design of law and computing technology that promotes social goals.

Topics of interest include but are not limited to:

    Auditing and trustworthiness of software
    Bridging gaps between legal and computational practice or scholarship  
    Broadening access to data and decision-making
    Computational empirical legal studies
    Cyber espionage and cyber war
    Cybersecurity regulation, computer crime, online law enforcement, and digital forensics
    Digital intellectual property
    Encryption and lawful surveillance
    Fairness and bias in machine learning, data analytics, and automated decision–making
    Human-rights law and computer science
    Legal and public-policy aspects of network measurement and network architecture
    Legal aspects of open-source software
    Mechanization and automation of legal reasoning
    Online market structure, platform monopolies, and antitrust law
    Platform governance, content moderation, disinformation, and freedom of online expression
    Privacy enhancing technologies and data protection
    Public ledgers, cryptocurrencies, and smart contracts
    Regulation and liability for artificial intelligence

All submitted papers will be evaluated based on their merits, particularly the extent to which their contributions are truly interdisciplinary. For papers that might raise ethical concerns, authors are expected to convince reviewers that proper procedures (such as IRB approval or responsible disclosure) have been followed and that due diligence has been done to minimize potential harms. Submitted papers may be rejected, at the discretion of the PC, for being out of scope. Authors who have questions about whether their papers are in scope are encouraged to ask the PC chairs in advance.

Because of the significant variation in scholarly methods and expository norms across the computing and legal communities, submissions should not be anonymized. Reviewers will be cautioned to avoid any biases resulting from author identity, other than what is directly relevant to the academic quality of the submitted work.

Because of the interdisciplinary nature of the symposium, authors will be provided with an optional opportunity to write brief rebuttals after receiving preliminary PC reviews but before final decisions are made. These are not meant to be extended debates about the papers. Instead, they are intended to help the PC appreciate the nature of a submission’s contributions in computer science or law in cases where the initial reviews may have applied different disciplinary standards than expected.