Dr Orla Lynskey

Dr Orla Lynskey

Associate Professor of Law

LSE Law School

Telephone
020-7955-7726
Room No
Cheng Kin Ku Building 6.22
Languages
English, French
Key Expertise
Human rights; EU law, particularly EU data protection law; IT Law

About me

Orla Lynskey is an Associate Professor, having joined the LSE Law School in 2012 and a Visiting Professor at the College of Europe. She teaches and conducts research in the areas of data protection, technology regulation, digital rights and EU law. She holds an LLB (Law and French) from Trinity College Dublin, an LLM in EU Law from the College of Europe (Bruges) and a PhD from the University of Cambridge. Prior to completing her doctorate, she worked as an academic assistant at the College of Europe (Bruges) and in public and private competition law practice in Brussels. She is an editor of International Data Privacy Law (OUP) and a Modern Law Review editorial committee member.  She is currently a member of the Ada Lovelace Institute's "Rethinking Data" working group.  

Administrative support: Law.Reception@lse.ac.uk

Research interests

Orla conducts research in the fields of technology regulation and digital rights, with her primary focus being on EU data protection and privacy law. Her previous work has focused on the dual dignitary and economic nature of personal data and the practical and normative limits of individual control over personal data ('informational self-determination'). She is currently working on inter-related projects on the fundamental rights implications of 'platform power' in digital markets and the EU's right to data portability.

External activities

  • Member of the Ada Lovelace Institute "Rethinking Data" Working Group (2019-2021)
  • Member of the Expert Panel for Grants for the Digital Freedom Fund (Ongoing)
  • Academic advisor to the European Consumer Organisation (BEUC) on "Consumer Protection 2.0" project (2020-2021)
  • Editor, European Law Blog
  • Editor, International Data Privacy Law (OUP)
  • Board Member, European Data Protection Law Review
  • Editorial Committee Member, Modern Law Review
  • Consultancy and advisory work: OECD Committees on Consumer Protection and Competition; Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada; the Commonwealth Secretariat.

Books

The Foundations of EU Data Protection Law (Oxford University Press, 2015)

Nearly two decades after the EU first enacted data protection rules, key questions about the nature and scope of this EU policy, and the harms it seeks to prevent, remain unanswered. The inclusion of a Right to Data Protection in the EU Charter has increased the salience of these questions, which must be addressed in order to ensure the legitimacy, effectiveness and development of this Charter right and the EU data protection regime more generally. 

The Foundations of EU Data Protection Law is a timely and important work which sheds new light on this neglected area of law, challenging the widespread assumption that data protection is merely a subset of the right to privacy. By positioning EU data protection law within a comprehensive conceptual framework, it argues that data protection has evolved from a regulatory instrument into a fundamental right in the EU legal order and that this right grants individuals more control over more forms of data than the right to privacy. It suggests that this dimension of the right to data protection should be explicitly recognised, while identifying the practical and conceptual limits of individual control over personal data. 

At a time when EU data protection law is sitting firmly in the international spotlight, this book offers academics, policy-makers, and practitioners a coherent vision for the future of this key policy and fundamental right in the EU legal order, and how best to realise it.

click here for publisher's site

Reports

'Understanding the risks to cross border transfer of personal data: EU-UK Data Adequacy' (Orla Lynskey, Maria Helen Murphy and Katherine Nolan), Department for the Economy - Northern Ireland , October 2023

Articles

At the crossroads of data protection and competition law: time to take stock.
Orla Lynskey.
I.D.P.L. 2018, 8(3), 179-180.A legal response to data-driven mergers, published in this book: 'Being Profiled: Cogitas Ergo Sum 10 Years of 'Profiling the European Citizen'' by Bayamlioglu, Baraliuc, Janssens and Hildebrandt (eds)

Teaching