Ahmed Ghappour

Biography

Ahmed Ghappour, an expert in criminal law and computer security, joined the full-time faculty of Boston University School of Law in 2017. He was previously a Visiting Assistant Professor at U.C. Hastings College of the Law where he taught Criminal Procedure and a seminar on Electronic Surveillance.

Ghappour’s research bridges computer science and the law to address contemporary challenges wrought by new technologies in the administration of criminal justice and national security. His recently published Stanford Law Review article, “Searching Places Unknown: Law Enforcement Jurisdiction on the Dark Web,” examines the foreign relations and national security implications of government hacking operations that use malware to pursue criminal suspects that use sophisticated cryptographic tools to anonymize their communications on the “dark web.” The article was competitively selected for presentation at the New Voices in National Security Law session of the 2017 American Association of Law Schools Annual Meeting, and the New Voices in International Law session of the 2017 American Society of International Law Annual Meeting.

Ghappour’s research and teaching interests stem from his experience litigating complex computer crime and national security cases. At U.C. Hastings, he founded the school’s Liberty, Security & Technology Clinic, which provided legal services to criminal defendants in espionage and computer crime cases. Prior to UC-Hastings, he taught the National Security Clinic at the University of Texas School of Law, represented Guantanamo detainees in their habeas corpus proceedings at Reprieve UK, and worked as a patent litigator at Orrick Herrington and Sutcliffe LLP. Formerly, Ghappour was a computer engineer focused on automation, diagnostics, distributed systems architecture and high performance computing.