About
An award-winning Italy-born naturalised British law academic with a passion for the law of emerging technologies, Professor Guido Noto La Diega (they/he) is Professor of Law, Technology and Innovation at the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, where the lead both the LLM/MSc Law, Technology, and Innovation, and the namesake research theme. Noto La Diega’s main expertise is in the European, Italian, and UK laws governing the Internet of Things, Artificial Intelligence, cloud computing, robotics, blockchain, and fashion, with a focus on Intellectual Property and private law (consumer protection, data governance, contracts, liability). Their work is animated by the conviction that the law should steer innovation in a socially just, inclusive, sustainable direction. As an Italy-qualified lawyer, Noto La Diega worked in one of the top commercial law firms in southern Italy.
Holder of a PhD (Unipa), a postdoc (QMUL), and an HEA Fellowship, Noto La Diega is the author of the groundbreaking open-access book Internet of Things and the Law and of several articles in leading international journals such as the European Intellectual Property Review and European Journal of Law & Technology; they also appeared in mainstream popular press such as Vogue, Sky News, CNET, Il Sole 24 Ore, ABC, and Wired. Noto La Diega’s works – published in English and Italian, and translated into Chinese, Russian, and Korean – have been cited by the EU Court of Justice's Advocate General, the House of Lords, the UK Intellectual Property Office, the World Economic Forum, the European Parliament, and the Council of Europe, amongst others. As a member of the European Commission’s Expert Group on AI and Data in Education and Training, Noto La Diega contributed to the EU Guidelines on AI in Education.
Noto La Diega has a strong bidding record, having been funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, Horizon Europe, the German Research Foundation, The Royal Society of Edinburgh, the Society of Legal Scholars, the British and Irish Law Education and Technology Association, the Modern Law Review, and Santander. They are currently leading the half-a-million-pound international project “From Smart Technologies to Smart Consumer Laws”. They have 14 years’ academic experience in the UK, Italy, Germany, Switzerland, Russia, Brazil, and the US, and they have delivered keynote speeches and presented their research in prestigious venues including the WTO Public Forum in Geneva, the Computers, Privacy & Data Protection Conference in Brussels, and the Intellectual Property Scholars Conference in New York.
Outside of Strathclyde, Noto La Diega is a Martin-Flynn Global Law Professor in the School of Law at the University of Connecticut; Fellow of the Nexa Center for Internet and Society; Expert of the European Data Protection Board; Research Associate at the UCL Centre for Blockchain Technologies; Scotland Advisory Council Member of the Open Rights Group; Advisory Board Member of the Gender Equality Special Interest Group at the European Law Institute; Steering Committee Member at the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO – Academic Research Programme); External Expert of the European Data Protection Board; and Research Grants Committee Member at the Society of Legal Scholars, the oldest and largest society of law academics in the UK and Ireland.
About the University of Strathclyde: the University of Strathclyde is a public research university located in Glasgow, Scotland. Founded in 1796 as the Andersonian Institute, it is Glasgow's second-oldest university, having received its royal charter in 1964 as the first technological university in the United Kingdom, and it is recognised as a leading international technological university that is socially progressive.
About the School of Law: the 6th best Law School in the UK (above Oxford) and 2nd in Scotland (The Times/Sunday Times Good University Guide 2024), Strathclyde Law School produces confident, capable graduates who are passionate about the possibilities of legal knowledge. Our group of internationally-respected scholars deliver an eclectic portfolio of forward-thinking programmes that are student-focused and designed to remain relevant in a fast-changing world. As well as delivering a robust legal education, modules and programmes explore such diverse topics as the environment, human rights, technology, commerce and penal change. In sixty years of educating the lawyers of the future, our goal has been to provide a quality of teaching and research that makes a difference to the world. Home to the student-led Mediation Clinic, the School’s philosophy is that legal knowledge can be used to effect positive change in communities.
About the MSc/LLM Law, Technology and Innovation: Strathclyde Law Schoo was the 1st in Scotland and 2nd in the UK to launch a master’s in Information Technology Law back in 1991: we build on solid foundations and we constantly renew ourselves.
Some of the highlights of the new LLM/MSc:
- It will teach highly employable multidisciplinary skills i.e. coding, statistics, and machine learning
- It caters for both those working in tech with an interest for law & regulation, and lawyers/law students with a passion for emerging technologies;
- It’s the first law master’s to benefit from a prestigious partnership with the Data Lab, providing a suite of scholarships, training, and placements
- Instead of the traditional dissertations, you can choose to do a Technology Design Project for law and legal application (perfect for the Legal Tech enthusiasts), Enhanced Research Proposal (for those wanting to do a PhD), Professional Internship or a Professional Project
Other blockchain scholars and centres at Strathclyde: Dr Birgit Schippers (Technology and Human Rights), Professor Mark Cummins (Director of the Financial Regulation Innovation Lab and of the FinTech research cluster), Dr Tariq Masood (Reader in Design, Manifacturing and Engineering Management) and Musa Ibrahim Bello (PhD researcher in blockchain and cybersecurity).
Contacts
Papers
Guido Noto La Diega and James Stacey, ‘Can Permissionless Blockchains be Regulated and Resolve some of the Problems of Copyright Law?’, in Massimo Ragnedda and Giuseppe Destefanis, Blockchain and Web 3.0: Social, Economic, and Technological Challenges (Routledge 2019) 30-47
Guido Noto La Diega, ‘Блокчейн, смарт-контракты и авторское право’ (2019) 14(3) Труды Института государства и права РАН 9
Guido Noto La Diega, ‘Blockchain-enabled smart contracts, copyright licensing, and the right to change one’s mind’ (Information Law and Policy Centre, 16 October 2019)
Rachel Allsopp, Guido Noto La Diega, Samantha Rasiah, Ann Thanarj, and Daria Onitiu, ‘Digital Currencies: An Analysis of Its Present Regulation in the UK: A Collaborative Essay by NINSO, the Northumbria Internet & Society Research Interest Group’ (Northumbria Legal Studies Working papers No 2019/03)
Projects
‘Smart contracts, copyright licensing and the right to change one's mind’ (International Conference «Civil anniversaries» - 110th anniversary of R. O. Khalfina, Contracts in the Digital Age, Moscow, 3 June 2019)
‘Can Permissionless Blockchains be Regulated and Resolve some of the Problems of Copyright Law?’ (Innovation and Technology Law Lab Colloquia, Padova, 16 April 2019)
‘Blockchain and Copyright. Can the blockchain be regulated and resolve some of the issues of copyright law?’ (HEC Paris Seminar, 18 March 2019)
‘Blockchain, smart contracts e proprietà intellettuale’ (Startup Course, University of Palermo, 10 May 2018)
‘Blockchain and copyright’ (University of Milan Doctoral School Law Seminar Series, 6 March 2018)
‘Distributed Ledger Technologies and Copyright: Risks and Opportunities’ (7th Law in Digital Era Conference, National Research University Higher School of Economics, Moscow, 20-22 November 2017)
‘Blockchain and intellectual property rights’ (La nuova proprietà intellettuale, la tutela del software, il blockchain, University of Palermo Startup Lawyers Course, Palermo, 6 October 2017)