Risk, Product Liability Trends, Triggers, and Insurance in Commercial Aerial Robots
David K. Breyer, Donna A. Dulo, Gale A. Townsley, and Stephen S. Wu

Donna A. Dulo

The commercialization of autonomous aerial robots, “drones” will become pervasive and ubiquitous across the national airspace over the coming years resulting in an increasing risk potential for drone operators and manufacturers. The risk and liability to these entities is entirely unknown due to the lack of historical data on which to determine liability triggers and trends to facilitate the development of accurate insurance underwriting trends. Product liability questions as well remain unanswered with causes of action such as strict product liability,negligence, breach of warranty, and the violation of the law against unfair and deceptive trade practices looming in the near future against operators and manufacturers.

Stephen S. Wu

Donna A. Dulo, Gale A. Townsley, and Stephen S. Wu will be speaking on the Panel on Domestic Drones on Saturday, April 5th at 3:15 PM at the University of Miami Newman Alumni Center with moderator F. Daniel Siciliano in Coral Gables, Florida.

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A Conservation Theory of Governance for Automated Law Enforcement
Gregory Conti, Woodrow Hartzog, John C. Nelson, and Lisa A. Shay

Lisa A. Shay

Woodrow Hartzog

However, the future portends an ever-increasing range of crimes that can be enforced through automated law enforcement systems. These advances bring opportunities for both good and harm. The legal, law enforcement, and policy making communities, as well as the general public, must carefully consider potential advantages, weigh the social cost and other risks, and challenge unsubstantiated claims of benefits.

Gregory Conti

John C. Nelson

Lisa A. Shay, Woodrow Hartzog, and Gregory Conti will be speaking on Saturday, April 5th at 1:45 PM with discussant Mary Anne Franks at the University of Miami Newman Alumni Center in Coral Gables, Florida.

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Considerations of a Legal Framework for the Safe and Resilient Operation of Autonomous Aerial Robots
Cameron R. Cloar and Donna A. Dulo

Cameron R. Cloar

Donna A. Dulo

This paper develops a legal framework which will present a unified foundation so that legal rules can be developed which will serve as the basis for the development and operation of autonomous aerial robots. The legal framework will ensure that designers and manufacturers have the freedom of invention and innovation while having a defined set of rules with which to develop their aerial robotic systems to ensure safe, resilient autonomous and semi-autonomous operations in the national airspace. While being initially developed for autonomous aerial robots, the legal framework will be readily adaptable to unmanned underwater robots, self-driving land vehicles, and any type of robotic vehicle that has varying degrees of autonomous capabilities. It will also call upon the regulatory framework for aircraft under the Federal Aviation Regulations, with a particular emphasis on the new consensus-driven standards that are envisioned will reshape the design and certification of small aircraft. The legal framework help will ensure that unmanned aerial robots become the safe and resilient transformative innovations that they are destined to be.

Donna A. Dulo will be on the Panel on Domestic Drones with moderator F. Daniel Siciliano on Saturday. April 5th at 3:15 PM at the University of Miami Newman Alumni Center in Coral Gables, Florida.

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Self-Defense Against Robots
A. Michael Froomkin and Zak Colangelo

A. Michael Froomkin

Deployment of robots in the air, the home, the office, and the street inevitably means their interactions with both property and living things will become more common and more complex. This paper examines when, under U.S. law, humans may use force against robots to protect themselves, their property, and their privacy. In the real world where Asimov’s Laws of Robotics do not exist, robots can pose—or can appear to pose—a threat to life, property, and privacy. May a landowner legally shoot down a trespassing drone? Can she hold a trespassing autonomous car as security against damage done or further torts? Is the fear that a drone may be operated by a paparazzo or a peeping Tom sufficient grounds to disable or interfere with it? How hard may you shove if the office robot rolls over your foot? This paper addresses all those issues and one more: what rules and standards we could put into place to make the resolution of those questions fairer to all concerned.

The default common-law legal rules governing each of these perceived threats are somewhat different, although reasonableness always plays an important role in defining legal rights and options. In certain cases—drone overflights, autonomous cars—national, state, and even local regulation may trump the common law. Because it is in most cases obvious that humans can use force to protect themselves against actual physical attack, the paper concentrates on the more interesting cases of (1) robot (and especially drone) trespass, (2) robot (and especially drone) spying, and (3) responses to perceived threats by robots—perceptions which may not always be justified, but which sometimes may nonetheless be considered reasonable in law.

Zak Colangelo

We argue that the scope of permissible self-help in defending one’s privacy should be quite broad.  We also identify seven problems in current law relating to human-robot interaction, all of which involve some kind of uncertainty — usually about what a robot can or will do — and suggest ways of solving or at least ameliorating them, either by making robots less potentially dangerous (banning the arming of robots) or by requiring robots to give clearer notice of their capabilities.

We conclude by looking at what the law on human self-defense against robots might tell us about a robot’s right to not be harmed by a human.

A. Michael Froomkin and Zak Colangelo will be on the Panel on Domestic Drones with moderator F. Daniel Siciliano on Saturday, April 5th at 3:15 PM at the University of Miami Newman Alumni Center in Coral Gables, Florida.

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Robotics and the New Cyberlaw
Ryan Calo

Ryan Calo

Ryan Calo will present “Robotics and the New Cyberlaw” with discussant David Post on Saturday, April 5th at 11:30 AM at the University of Miami Newman Alumni Center in Coral Gables, Florida.

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Chief Justice John Roberts is a Robot
Ian Kerr and Carissima Mathen

The title of this article is not pejorative. It is suggestive. It asks readers to imagine the following counterfactual.

Ian Kerr

Around the globe, people awaken to some very strange news. In different languages, the same headline thunders: “Chief Justice John Roberts is a Robot.”  Badly injured during an ambush and attempted kidnapping while attending a conference at the House of Lords, Roberts’ captors boldly delivered-him-up to the Royal London Hospital and sped off.  In urgent and unusual circumstances—and in breach of US and international protocols—a team of emergency surgeons cut him open to discover that his biology ran only skin deep.

After weeks of follow-up investigations and interviews, it is learned that “John Roberts” did indeed graduate from Harvard Law School in 1979 and that “his” legal career unfolded exactly as documented in public life. However, John Roberts, Robot (JR-R) was in fact a highly advanced prototype of the US Robots and Mechanical Men Corporation, developed during the period chronologically corresponding with what would have been “his” high school and college years. After several (earlier) A-series JRs had secretly annihilated the Turing test, US Robots decided to consolidate its successful AI with emerging robotic technologies in the new R-series machines. As part of its research and development, the company initiated a singular, long-term experiment with a lifelike, autonomous social robot that was virtually indistinguishable from human beings.

Carissima Mathen

In its role as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, JR-R wrote and participated in a number of landmark decisions. In this article we investigate the legitimacy of JR-R’s tenure on the Court. Through this philosophical thought experiment, we consider whether it matters that a machine generated legal reasons for judgment.

With this counterfactual, we set the stage for future philosophical discussions about expert systems, artificial intelligence and the coming era of mechanical jurisprudence—an era where the production of at least some legal knowledge and decision-making is delegated to machines and algorithms, not people.

Ian Kerr and Carissima Mathen will present Chief Justice John Roberts is a Robot on Saturday, April 5th at 8:30 AM with discussant Jack Balkin at the University of Miami Newman Alumni Center in Coral Gables, Florida.

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