-Meredith Whittaker, describing her job, but doing a damn good job of also describing what I do

My name is Heather Burns and I am a tech policy wonk based in Glasgow, Scotland. I work for an open web built around international standards of human rights, privacy, accessibility, and freedom of expression. That means I advocate for policy and technology developments which keep the internet open, globally connected, secure, and trustworthy.

There are four main challenges* at the intersection of politics, law, human rights, and technology:

• Maintaining a free, open and secure internet;
• Preventing abuses of the internet which erode human rights and damage open democracy;
• Providing appropriate checks and balances on the uses and abuses of the internet for commercial purposes; and
• Avoiding and discouraging regulation that governments may abuse for the purposes of surveillance, censorship and suppression of dissent.

Those challenges are the spaces where I work.

I’ve been Extremely Online since 1994. I built my first web site in 1996 in Lynx on Unix. You can read the rest of the story in the introduction to my book.

This is my personal site, and the content and opinions on it do not reflect the opinions of any current contractor or previous employer.

Issues I’m tracking now for clients

• The impact of the second Trump administration on the online world outside the US (I can’t believe I had to type that, but here we are)
• The clean slate of digital policy under Labour, now that the Conservatives and their Brexit/culture war approach to those issues have been thoroughly discarded
• The UK Online Safety Act’s implementation via Ofcom
• The UK Investigatory Powers (Amendment) Bill (passed)
  
• The UK Data Protection and Digital Information Bill (here we go again)
• …and how all of the above will impact service providers who are not Big Tech, as well as those who use any service regardless of who makes it
• Policy developments in the US, EU, and rest of world and how they specifically interact with, or clash, with UK policies, and
• Miscellaneous assorted mischief, mirth, and good trouble

Want me to work with you?

I’m currently freelancing with gigs and contract work in the policy x digital rights space. I’d also be more than happy to discuss the right full-time job with the right team (see criteria below).

So if you’re thinking about bringing me in for either:

I work with smart, proactive, critical thinkers. And so I support teams who bring those people on board, rather than avoiding them. I’m at my best in projects and organisations that are fearless, provocative, and show up to fight the good fights.

As for where I do that from, I work remote from Glasgow, which is Not London, and so I work with people who don’t have a problem with that.

I’m back to school this academic year, so I’m working flexibly between classes.

As always, the usual filters apply. I’m not a lawyer, or an academic, and I don’t have a Ph.D. I don’t work with big tech, I don’t work in corporate compliance, and I’m waaay too outspoken for government and civil service.

Also, I do not deal with recruitment consultants or recruitment agencies, ever, of any kind. Do not waste my time, or yours.

We good? Contact details below.

TFW you unbox your own book. Yes those are William Morris shoes.

Past work

• 2022: Head of Policy and Governance, MaidSafe
• 2020 – 2021: Policy Manager, Open Rights Group
• 2015 – 2020: Freelance tech policy and regulation specialist for clients across the startup, digital rights, privacy, digital agency, and games sectors
• 2011 – 2020: Open source software contributor and community member
• 2007 – 2015: Full-time web designer and developer
• 2000 – 2005: Worked in international relations and community development

In August 2018 I was flattered to be named as Smashing Magazine’s Person of the Week for my work on GDPR and privacy. Photo taken by some Geordie in a Belgrade dive bar run by two refugees from Reading ’94.

*Taxonomy from Regulating Free Speech in a Digital Age by David Bromell.