Maine Law has a distinguished roster of full-time, adjunct, and visiting professors teaching in the privacy law space. The school also has an impressive record when it comes to attorneys and experts instructing courses for the Information Privacy Summer Institute. Read more about our faculty and pat institute instructors below.
Scott Bloomberg
Associate Professor of Law
Director, Information Privacy Law Program
Scott joined the University of Maine School of Law in August 2020 and has been teaching Information Privacy Law since that time. He was appointed as the Director of Maine Law’s Information Privacy Law Program in July 2022. In that capacity, Scott oversees the academic requirements for graduating with a Certificate in Information Privacy Law, serves as the faculty advisor for the Student Journal of Information Privacy Law, and assists in developing curricular and experiential learning opportunities for students. Scott also teaches Constitutional Law, First Amendment, and Cannabis Law.
Peter Guffin
Professor of Practice
Peter taught Information Privacy Law as an adjunct professor at Maine Law for several years before becoming a Professor of Practice in 2016. He also served as the Director of the Information Privacy Law Program from 2020-2022. Peter has taught Cybersecurity Law, the Information Privacy Practicum, and other upper-level privacy courses at Maine Law. In addition, Peter heads Pierce Atwood LLP’s Privacy & Data Security practice and has served as an arbitrator in the EU-U.S. Privacy Shield program.
Christine Davik
Professor of Law
Christine joined Maine Law in 2001 and has over 20 years of experience teaching courses related to Intellectual Property. As is most relevant to Maine Law’s Information Privacy Program, Christine regularly teaches Internet Law. Her scholarship focuses on intellectual property law with particular emphasis on issues related to the Internet and control of information.
Deborah Johnson
Associate Professor of Law
Professor Deborah Johnson joined Maine Law’s faculty in July of 2023. Johnson joins the law school from North Carolina Central University School of Law where she was a Visiting Assistant Professor. Johnson also spent eight years as the Director of Diversity and Outreach with Roger Williams University School of Law. Johnson also brings her extensive professional and scholarly expertise in insurance law with her, and plans to deepen her scholarship surrounding issues of privacy law and cybersecurity.
Trevor Hughes
Adjunct Professor
President & CEO, International Association of Privacy Professionals
Trevor is the President & CEO of the IAPP—the world’s largest association of privacy professionals. Trevor is a Maine Law alumnus and has taught Information Privacy Law and other privacy-related courses at Maine Law. He has been widely recognized as a leading privacy expert, appearing at SXSW, RSA and other privacy and technology events. Trevor has contributed to media outlets such as the New York Times, TechCrunch, and WIRED and has provided testimony on issues of privacy, surveillance, and privacy-sensitive technologies before the U.S. Congress, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, British Parliament and more.
Virginia Lee
Adjunct Professor
Americas Privacy Officer, Cisco
Ginny Lee is the Americas Privacy Officer for Cisco and previously served as the Head of Global Data Privacy at ServiceNow; the Director of Global Privacy at Starbucks; the Senior Attorney for Privacy & Security at Intel Corp.; and the Director of Platform & Product Privacy at Yahoo. Ginny is a Maine Law alumnus and has co-taught the Information Privacy Practicum with Professor Guffin.
Adam Barea
Adjunct Professor
Director of Strategy, Alphabet (Google) Regulatory Response, Investigations & Strategy
Adam is a Legal Director at Google LLC, and served as lead in-house litigation counsel on numerous high profile matters, including Viacom v. YouTube, Rosetta Stone v. Google, and Google v. Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood. He also managed the General Litigation team at Google. Since 2011, Adam’s teams have focused on consumer protection, user safety, and related regulatory issues arising from high-risk third party content appearing on Google’s platforms globally. He also served as co-chair of the board for the Center for Safe Internet Pharmacies, and currently sits on the board of the Partnership to End Addiction. Prior to joining Google, Adam was a litigator at Cooley LLP in Washington, D.C. He graduated from Columbia College (’96) and Columbia School of Law (’99), and clerked for the late Honorable Alexander Harvey, II in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland.
Summer Institute Professors
Rita Heimes
Senior Affiliate Fellow
Director, Information Privacy Summer Institute
Rita is general counsel and privacy officer/DPO at the International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP). At Maine Law, she directs at teaches at the annual Information Privacy Summer Institute, which is a series of summer courses on critical and current information privacy issues. Rita was previously a Professor and the Academic Dean at Maine Law.
Chinmayi Sharma
Chinmayi Sharma is a Scholar in Residence at the Robert Strauss Center for International Security and Law and a Lecturer at the University of Texas at Austin School of Law. Her research and teaching focus on cybersecurity, surveillance, computer crime, tort, administrative law, and criminal law/procedure. She is a member of Foreign Policy for America, the open source working group at the Atlantic Council, the Transatlantic Cyber Forum, the young professional cohort at the Council on Foreign Relations, Internet Law Foundry, and the Yale Cyber Leadership Fellow. She has written extensively for Lawfare, primarily on the topics of cybersecurity and surveillance.
Gabe Maldoff (2023-2019 Summer Institute Professor)
Associate, Goodwin’s Data, Privacy, and Cybersecurity Practice Group.
Gabe is an associate in Goodwin’s Data, Privacy, and Cybersecurity practice. He has extensive experience advising organizations on global privacy laws and has taught the Summer Institute’s Global Privacy Law course for the past four years. Gabe has authored numerous articles about U.S., Canadian, European, and other global privacy regimes. He currently serves as a member of the Arbitration Panel for the EU-U.S. Privacy Shield Framework.
Stephenie Handler (2022 Summer Institute Professor)
Director, Cybersecurity Strategy and Digital Acceleration, McKinsey & Co.
Stephenie recently joined Gibson Dunn as a Partner in the firm’s International Trade and Privacy, Cybersecurity, and Data Innovation practice groups. She was formerly the Director, Cybersecurity Strategy and Digital Acceleration at McKinsey & Company, where she has also served as associate general counsel for cybersecurity. Stephenie has a JD from Stanford Law School, an MS in National Security Studies from Georgetown University, and is a graduate of the US Naval Academy, following which she served as a Captain in the Marine Corps for 7 years.
Kirk Nahra (2022, 2020, 2019 Summer Institute Professor)
Partner, WilmerHale
Kirk is partner and Co-Chair of WilmerHale’s global Cybersecurity and Privacy Practice as well as Co-Chair of the Big Data Practice. He assists companies in a wide range of industries in analyzing and implementing the requirements of privacy and security laws across the country and internationally. He teaches both Information Privacy Law and Health Care Privacy and Data Security Law as an adjunct professor at the Washington College of Law at American University, and teaches and guest lectures on these and other privacy topics at a variety of other law schools. He currently serves as a fellow with the Cordell Institute for Policy in Medicine & Law at Washington University in St. Louis and as a fellow with the Institute for Critical Infrastructure Technology. He received the 2021 Privacy Vanguard Award from IAPP in recognition of his “exceptional leadership, knowledge and creativity in privacy and data protection.”
Justin Weiss (2023, 2021, 2018 Summer Institute Professor)
Global Head of Data Privacy, Naspers & Prosus
Justin leads data privacy within Naspers—a South African global internet group and one of the largest technology investors in the world. In his role, Justin counsels executives, corporate finance, artificial intelligence, product, engineering and public affairs teams on data policy, risk and privacy programme management. Previously, Justin served as Assistant General Counsel for Privacy & International Policy at Yahoo! and as an expert privacy advisor to the OECD’s Working Party on Information Security and Privacy. He currently serves as the Chairman of the Board of Directors of the International Association of Privacy Professionals. Justin graduated from the University of Maine School of Law in 2006.
Chris Hart (2021 Summer Institute Professor)
Chris is a partner and the co-chair of Foley Hoag’s Privacy and Data Security practice, where he counsels clients on data privacy and cybersecurity compliance, incident response, government investigations, and litigation stemming from an organization’s data management and governance practices. Chris has experience advising clients on the CCPA, GDPR, and numerous other privacy laws.
Brittan Heller (2021 Summer Institute Professor)
Brittan is an internationally recognized expert on the intersection of human rights, technology, and the law. She is currently a research fellow at the Atlantic Council and has also served as Counsel AI and Technology Fellow at Harvard’s Kennedy School, a senior associate at CSIS’s Human Rights Initiative, as an affiliate at Harvard’s Berkman Klein Center on Internet and Society, as a Carr Center Technology and Human Rights Fellow, as a founder of the ADL’s Center for Technology and Society, and more. Brittan also worked as a practicing attorney at Foley Hoag, where she was a member of the firm’s Global Business & Human Rights practice group and head of the firm’s Global AI practice group.
Ryan Kriger (2023, 2020, 2019 Summer Institute Professor)
Ryan is a Consumer Protection & Privacy Attorney at the Federal Trade Commission, working in the Division of Privayc and Identity Protection. Prior to his time at the FTC, Ryan worked in the Vermont Attorney General’s office, focusing on privacy and data security issues. He is a member of the Vermont Governor’s Cybersecurity Advisory Team and is also a lecturer at the University of Vermont.
Woodrow Hartzog (2018 Summer Institute Professor)
Woody is a Professor of Law at Boston University School of Law. Prior to his time at BU, Prof. Hartzog held a joint appointment at Northeastern University School of Law and Northeastern’s Khoury College of Computer Sciences. He is one of the most well-known scholars in the field of information privacy and technology law, having published articles in journals such as the Yale Law Journal, Columbia Law Review, University of Chicago Law Review, California Law Review, Notre Dame Law Review, and Michigan Law Review.
Heather Egan Sussman (2017 Summer Institute Professor)
Heather is a partner at Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP, where she focuses on cybersecurity, privacy and information management. She has previously practiced in the areas of privacy and data protection at Ropes & Gray and at McDermott Will & Emery. Heather has been ranked by Chambers USA, Chambers Global, and The Legal 500 United States as a leader in these fields.
Dennis Hirsch (2017 Summer Institute Professor)
Dennis is a Professor of Law and the Director of the Ohio State University Moritz College of Law’s Program on Data and Governance. He also holds the title of Professor of Law at Capital University Law School. Professor Hirsch is a prolific scholar and has published articles in the Illinois Law Review, the Georgia Law Review, Maryland Law Review, Maine Law Review, the Indiana Law Journal, the Administrative Law Review and numerous other law journals.