Michael Zimmer, PhD, is a scholar of privacy, surveillance, and data ethics at Marquette University, where he serves as Director of the Center for Data Ethics and Professor & Vice-Chair in the Department of Computer Science. Recognized globally as an expert in online privacy, data ethics, and internet research ethics, his scholarship and insights are used by researchers, ethics bodies, and government & industry partners worldwide, and he serves on multiple ethics committees and advisory boards.

Dr. Zimmer’s interdisciplinary research explores the social and ethical implications of digital technologies and platforms, with a particular focus on digital privacy & surveillance, internet research ethics, pervasive data practices, and the ethical challenges of big data and artificial intelligence. He integrates research with teaching, curriculum development, and professional outreach — from foundational courses in computers & society to advanced seminars in professional and data ethics — to equip the next generation of data and computing professionals with tools for ethical discernment and responsible data practices.

📄 Pervasive Data & Emerging Technologies

As a founding member of the PERVADE (Pervasive Data Ethics for Computational Research) project, Zimmer investigates how researchers, platforms, regulators, and user communities confront the complex ethical challenges posed by computational research using large-scale, pervasive datasets about people. Other recent projects have explored the privacy and ethical risks posed by emerging technologies, including wearable fitness trackers, smart-home devices, autonomous vehicles, femtech applications, and predictive algorithms.

📄 The Zuckerberg Files & Public Engagement

Zimmer also curates The Zuckerberg Files, a digital archive of all public utterances of Facebook’s founder and CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, and he was an advisor to Gizmodo on the responsible release of The Facebook Papers. He recently appeared in the “Facebook Gets a Facelift” episode of Vox’s Land of the Giants podcast series, and was featured in the Sky documentary film Zuckerberg: King of the Metaverse.

🌐 Ethics Leadership & Service

Dr. Zimmer currently co-chairs the AoIR Ethics Working Group, serves on the ACM SIGCHI Research Ethics Committee, and routinely provides data ethics expertise to a range of academic and professional communities. From 2021–2024, he served as ethics advisor for the European Commission-sponsored SPATIAL Project. In 2025, he was appointed to the Computing Research Association’s Computing Community Consortium (CCC) Council. Zimmer is also a member of the ACM Committee on Professional Ethics (COPE).

🎓 Research Funding & Support

Dr. Zimmer’s work has been supported by the National Science Foundation, the Social Science Research Council, the Association for the Advancement of Science, the Northwestern Mutual Data Science Institute, the Institute of Museum and Library Services, and other sources.

🏛 Advocacy, Government & Research Oversight

Zimmer regularly engages with advocacy, government, and industry groups on matters of data ethics and research oversight, including the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine’s Committee on Science, Technology, and Law, the Office of Human Research Protection within the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, the Secretary’s Advisory Committee on Human Research Protections (SACHRP), and the Presidential Summit of the National Association of Attorneys General. He is frequently invited to speak with Institutional Review Boards (IRBs) and other regulatory bodies on the ethical challenges posed by big data, algorithmic research, and emerging technologies.

🔗 Editorial Roles

As co-editor of The Information Society book series for MIT Press, Zimmer has overseen the publication of numerous academic titles by leading global scholars. He also sits on the editorial boards for the journals below.

🎙 Media & Public Scholarship

Zimmer has written for Wired, The Washington Post, and The Huffington Post, and has been a guest on National Public Radio’s All Things Considered, Morning Edition, Science Friday, and Here & Now public radio news programs. Zimmer has appeared in news articles for The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Atlantic, and regularly appears in various other national and local media outlets.