Meet Jeff Kosseff: Exploring Free Speech in a Changing Digital World

Before Jeff Kosseff studied the First Amendment as a lawyer and professor, he experienced its protections as a journalist. Working in journalism after college, he was inspired to explore the laws that protect reporting and public expression more deeply. This interest continues to shape his research and teaching as technology raises new questions about speech and security.

Kosseff brings that perspective to the University of Minnesota’s Hubbard School of Journalism & Mass Communication as the Silha Professor of Media Ethics and Law and director of the Silha Center for the Study of Media Ethics and Law. He also holds a joint faculty appointment with the University of Minnesota Law School. His work examines free speech law, protections for online expression, and how governments can regulate and promote cybersecurity. Whether bringing current events into classroom discussions or exploring the unanswered questions surrounding artificial intelligence, he connects legal principles with the challenges of a changing digital world.

What are your areas of specialty? How did you become interested in what you study and teach?

My primary area of research focus is free speech law. I was a journalist right out of college, and I experienced firsthand the protections of the First Amendment. This shaped my interests later as a lawyer and a law professor, causing me to focus on the First Amendment and other protections for online speech. I also study cybersecurity and how governments can best regulate and promote it.

What courses are you currently teaching or looking forward to teaching soon? What's special about them?

I'm currently teaching cybersecurity law in the [UMN] Law School, and I love bringing current events into the class discussion. I'm looking forward to teaching media law in Hubbard next semester, as I've always had a passion for educating students about how the First Amendment protects journalists.

What are you most excited about right now? What gets you up in the morning?

Right now, I'm particularly excited about the incredibly novel challenges presented by artificial intelligence. There are so many unanswered questions about how the First Amendment applies to AI, and how governments and industry could prevent devastating cybersecurity compromises.

What projects are you working on right now?

I'm currently writing a book with [Professor] Eric Goldman, [associate dean for research and co-director of the Datta Center for High Tech Law at Santa Clara University School of Law]  about how the Internet has brought society so many pro-social benefits over the past three decades. So much of the current debate has focused on the harms of the Internet, and we hope to tell a more complete story about how the Internet has changed lives for the better.

Understanding a Changing Digital World 

From the protections he encountered in the newsroom to the questions he now studies about artificial intelligence, Kosseff’s work follows the evolving relationship between law, speech, and technology. His teaching and research bring these questions to our campus community and our state inviting us to consider both the challenges of digital communication and the ways it can improve lives. 

This story was written by Vicky Jang, an undergraduate student in CLA.