Sinziana Gutiu

Sinziana (Sinzi) is a lawyer who is spiritedly pursuing the seriousness of her craft while trying to maintain a healthy dose of sanity and humour. Realizing that “we only see clearly with our heart” and that “what is essential is invisible to the eyes” has served her well in this journey so far.

After completing a B.A. in Criminology at Simon Fraser University, Sinzi had no idea that attending uOttawa law meant embarking on an adventure into the captivating world of technology law (an adventure that continues to this day!). It all started when she met Ian in her first week of law school and was inspired by his innovative thinking, empowering and passionate approach to teaching, and renowned expertise in technology law and ethics.

Sinzi had the privilege of being on Ian's research assistant (RA) team throughout law school, where she researched and wrote on the ethical, social and legal effects of RFID, biometrics, lawful access in police investigations, airport body scanners, digital memory, Facebook, ambient intelligence, and robotics (to only name a few). Sinzi assisted and participated in presentations before the Federal Department of Justice and the Federal Office of the Privacy Commissioner, and attended conferences at Stanford University and Miami School of Law. She also went on enlightening trips with Ian’s RA team to Willow Garage in Palo Alto, California and Googleplex in Mountain View, California, and spent a January term at the University of Radboud in the Netherlands, researching and writing about behavioural advertising and its effects on European Union and Canadian data protection/privacy laws. Sinzi’s law school voyage culminated in her writing a paper on consent and human-robot interactions, which she presented at the We Robot conference in Miami. That paper was later published in a book co-edited by Ian titled “Robot Law”.

Sinzi is certain that her experience working with Ian and being his mentee has been the most significant influence in the development of her career. After being called to the British Columbia bar, Sinzi practised in the areas of cyber liability, privacy law, professional liability, insurance law, construction law and commercial litigation both at international and boutique law firms in Vancouver. She is currently working for the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner of BC, where she is honing her expertise in privacy law by consulting with private organizations and public bodies and commenting on the privacy and access implications of cutting-edge technologies. Sinzi also volunteers as an executive member of the CBABC Privacy & FOI Subsection, and sits on the board of directors of the Canadian Institute for Information & Privacy Studies.