Emerging Technologies
Future of Warfare and Law Series – The Law and LAWS
Editors’ note: This post is part of a series featuring topics discussed during the Third Annual Future of Warfare and the Law Symposium. Christina Colclough’s introductory post is available here. In May of 2025, the third Future of Warfare and the Law Symposium...
Future of Warfare and Law Series – Addressing Uncertainty in the Use of Autonomous Weapons Systems
Editors’ note: This post is part of a series featuring topics discussed during the Third Annual Future of Warfare and the Law Symposium. LTC Christina Colclough’s introductory post is available here. The Future of Warfare and the Law Symposium, which took place in May...
Future of Warfare and Law Series – Introduction
Editors’ note: This post introduces a series featuring topics discussed during the Third Annual Future of Warfare and the Law Symposium. This past May, a community of military legal scholars and technical experts met at the Third Annual Future of Warfare and the Law...
Military Use of Biometrics Series – The Body Does Not Lie, or Does It? Towards a Disability-Inclusive Approach to Military Biometrics
Editors’ note: This post is part of a series relating to the law applicable to the military use of biometrics. It is drawn from the author’s article-length work, “The Military Fantasy of Biometrics: Neglecting the Risks of the Normalizing of Bodies During Armed...
Military Use of Biometrics Series – Israel’s Use of AI-DSS and Facial Recognition Technology: The Erosion of Civilian Protection in Gaza
Editors’ note: This post is part of a series relating to the law applicable to the military use of biometrics. It is drawn from the author’s article-length work, “The Use of the ‘Lavender’ in Gaza and the Law of Targeting: AI-Decision Support Systems and Facial...
Military Use of Biometrics Series – Necrometrics and Contextualising Human Remains in Armed Conflict
Editors’ note: This post is part of a series relating to the law applicable to the military use of biometrics. It is drawn from the author’s article-length work, “Biometrics to Necrometrics: What the Dead Can Tell Us About War” appearing in the Journal of...
Military Use of Biometrics Series – Introduction
On 7-8 May 2024, a conference brought together a group of scholars and practitioners to discuss the law applicable to the use of biometrics by armed forces. The conference, which took place in Tallinn, Estonia, was organized by the War Studies Research Centre (WSRC)...
When Belligerent Drones Knock on Neutral Waters: Archipelagic Sea Lanes in the Age of Kamikaze Systems
In 2024 to 2025, escalating tensions between Israel and Iran saw waves of missiles and drones cross regional skies. Jordan, a neutral (non-belligerent) State, intercepted many of these projectiles as they entered its airspace. From an international law perspective,...
Unleashing Drone Dominance: Rethinking Department of Defense Weapons Reviews
In November 2001, the United States conducted what is considered to be the first ever armed drone attack in Afghanistan. Over the next twenty years, the United States dominated the production of large unmanned systems that cost millions of dollars each to produce. In...
Diverging Standards in the Legal Review of LAWS
In May 2025, Anduril Industries publicly unveiled Fury (YFQ-44A), a next-generation autonomous aircraft currently under evaluation by the U.S. Air Force as part of its Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA) program. Fury takes its first test flights this summer. The goal...
Brian Christian’s The Alignment Problem: A Cautionary Tale to Proponents of LAWS
Brian Christian’s The Alignment Problem: Machine Learning and Human Values is an accessible, comprehensive look under the hood of contemporary machine learning. The title suggests, and Christian states, “This book is about machine learning and human values: about...
Interning a Hacker
Recently, at a workshop at Harvard Law School, I grappled with the question of internment in any international armed conflict (IAC) in the near future. It is a question some are uncomfortable with, although the concept of internment remains legally available under...
