Professor Lauren Scholz

Lauren Scholz is an assistant professor at Florida State University in Tallahassee, Florida. Her research focuses on contract law and privacy. She is interested in how private law can promote – or inhibit – human flourishing in liberal societies. For example, in her recent paper "Fiduciary Boilerplate" she argued that many information-age consumer relationships are relationships of trust, meaning that firms owe consumers a duty of loyalty that is not disclaimable by contract. That would constitute at minimum limits on using data to the direct detriment of consumers. This limits excessive unilateral transfer of power and authority to industry unsanctioned by governmental authority. 

In her current project she examines the role of private rights of action in privacy law. Private rights of action affirm the status of individuals and groups as rights-bearers, and bring information about the private sphere to the public record. Regardless of how cases are resolved, this is useful for both social ordering and potential legislation. A chronic issue in the information age is the lack of public information, allowing firms to simply claim the best way of regulating is to reduce costs for them, the source of innovation. This issue sheds light on the particular role of civil recourse in the regulation of the newly possible.

At the Weizenbaum Institut, she hopes to learn more about current European approaches to consumer contract law, particularly with respect to data use and data protection. She also wants to learn more about privacy enforcement under European law.

Before coming to FSU, she was a fellow at Harvard Law School and Yale Law School. She graduated from law school at Harvard and did her undergraduate at Yale.