Dr. Cristiano de Souza Therrien is a Research Associate with the University Research Chair in Technology and Society at the University of Ottawa Centre for Law, Technology and Society.
Dr. Cristiano de Souza Therrien’s research focuses on AI governance, privacy law, digital sovereignty, and the interplay between civil and common law traditions, including how ethical principles and technical standards interact with law in data governance.
Dr. Therrien holds an LL.D. from the Université de Montréal and completed a Global Professional LL.M. (GPLLM), in the Canadian Law in a Global Context concentration, at the University of Toronto Faculty of Law. He first joined the Centre for Law, Technology and Society as a Scotiabank Postdoctoral Fellow in AI and Regulation (2022-2023), before returning as a Research Associate in 2026.
Dr. Therrien is a lecturer at Université de Montréal and Toronto Metropolitan University, and also teaches in the graduate programs at UERJ/ITS Rio and the graduate law program of the University of Passo Fundo (PPGD/UPF) in Brazil. He is a former Chief Information Officer of the City of Fortaleza, Brazil, and co-founder of a technology law firm. He is a Certified Information Privacy Manager (CIPM) and Certified Information Privacy Professional/Canada (CIPP/C).