The Commons Lab is excited to announce a long-anticipated publication by Privacy Lawyer Robert Gellman on Crowdsourcing, Citizen Science, and the Law: Legal Issues Affecting Federal Agencies.
This report reviews the legal and regulatory issues that federal agencies face when they engage in citizen science and crowdsourcing activities. It identifies relevant issues that most federal agencies must consider, reviews the legal standards, suggests ways that agencies can comply with or lawfully evade requirements, and discusses practical approaches that can ease the path for federal citizen science and crowdsourcing projects, including procedural activities, cooperative actions, legislative changes, and regulatory adjustments.
The Commons Lab plans to print a policy memo based on the key points in the report, to be released this summer during a Wilson Center event. In addition we will be digitizing the legal work flow that federal practitioners must undertake to comply with federal regulations when beginning a citizen science or crowdsourcing effort. Check back with us soon!
To download the whole report: http://www.wilsoncenter.org/publication/crowdsourcing-citizen-science-and-the-law-legal-issues-affecting-federal-agencies
