The 4th ACM Symposium on Computer Science and Law (CS&Law ’25) is soliciting submissions of scholarship taking a holistic, interdisciplinary approach to the field of computer science and law. We seek papers that draw substantially on both fields, not just one or the other. Successful papers will not simply apply computer science to law or apply legal analysis to computer-related technologies, but instead will integrate the two disciplines in a way that surpasses what either could accomplish by itself.
Submissions can consist either of original research or of systematizations of knowledge (SoKs). SoKs are papers that evaluate, systematize, and contextualize existing knowledge, often providing important new viewpoints, challenging long-held beliefs, or devising useful taxonomies. SoK contributions that present, discuss, and compare educational methodologies and experiences at the nexus of CS and Law are welcome as well. Several tracks for submitting papers will be considered, as detailed below.
Submission Link: https://cslaw25.hotcrp.com/
Submission deadline: September 30, 2024
Preliminary reviews released to authors: October 28, 2024
Optional rebuttals due: November 4, 2024
Accept/reject notification: December 2, 2024
Camera-ready proceedings papers due: February 3, 2025
Submission deadline: January 14, 2025
Accept/reject notification: February 3, 2025
Drafts for circulation due: March 10, 2025
Submission deadline: March 19, 2025
Accept/reject notification: March 26, 2025
March 25–27, 2025
fortiss and Technical University of Munich
Munich, Germany
Advances in algorithmic data processing, cryptography, artificial intelligence, networking, databases, software engineering, and many other fields of computer science have raised difficult legal questions. At the same time, computational methods have shed new light on legal problems in domains ranging from criminal procedure to evidence to intellectual property. These intersections have created a growing need for research that combines deep understanding of the power and the limitations of computing with expertise in multiple aspects of law.
The ACM Symposium on Computer Science and Law is the flagship conference for the emerging field of computer science and law. It brings together a community of scholars, lawyers, and computing professionals who are fluent in both computational thinking (with its rigorous mathematical formalisms) and legal scholarship and thought (with its equally rigorous yet human-centric set of principles, methodologies, and goals). Central to the study of “computer science and law” is the creation of a body of scholarship aimed at the co-design of law and computing technology that promotes social goals.
All submitted papers will be evaluated based on their merits, particularly the extent to which their contributions are truly interdisciplinary. For papers that might raise ethical concerns, authors are expected to convince reviewers that proper procedures (such as IRB approval or responsible disclosure) have been followed and that due diligence has been done to minimize potential harms. Submitted papers may be rejected, at the discretion of the PC, for being out of scope. Authors who have questions about whether their papers are in scope are encouraged to ask the PC chairs in advance.
Because of the significant variation in scholarly methods and expository norms across the computing and legal communities, submissions should not be anonymized. Reviewers will be cautioned to avoid any biases resulting from author identity, other than what is directly relevant to the academic quality of the submitted work.
Because of the interdisciplinary nature of the symposium, authors will be provided with an optional opportunity to write brief rebuttals after receiving preliminary PC reviews but before final decisions are made. These are not meant to be extended debates about the papers. Instead, they are intended to help the PC appreciate the nature of a submission’s contributions in computer science or law in cases where the initial reviews may have applied different disciplinary standards than expected.
Authors may choose to submit work in any of the following tracks. Multiple submissions are allowed. Work that is rejected from one track may be submitted in a subsequent one (e.g., a rejected paper may be resubmitted as a work in progress or lightning talk).
At least one author of each accepted paper is required to attend (in person or online) in order to present the paper and is expected to participate actively in the symposium. Symposium proceedings will be published in digital form only and made available in open-access mode at no cost to authors.
Papers accepted for publication will be published in the symposium proceedings. The PC may in its discretion choose to decline papers submitted for publication and to offer the authors the opportunity to give a presentation only. Presentations may be given in person or remotely. Only papers submitted for publication will be eligible for Best Paper and Best Early-Career Paper awards.
Papers submitted for publication must not have been published or accepted for publication or be under review by a conference or workshop with published proceedings. However, simultaneous submissions are allowed when they are submitted in substantially expanded form to refereed journals (including student-run law reviews). For example, authors of papers who intend to submit them to law reviews in the February 2025 window may submit 10-page versions of those papers to CS&Law ’25. Similarly, authors may simultaneously submit 10-page papers for publication at CS&Law ’25 and substantially expanded versions of those papers to journals in Computer Science and other disciplines.
Submissions should be in PDF format on US letter-size paper, with a text size of at least 11 points and margins of at least .75 inches. While there is no limit to the number of pages in a submission, the first 10 pages (excluding the title page and the references) should include sufficient information to evaluate the submission. In particular, reviewers will be expected to read only the first 10 pages and may choose to read or not read additional pages at their discretion. The submission should begin with a title, followed by the names, affiliations and contact information of all authors, and a short abstract. It should contain a scholarly exposition of ideas, techniques, and results, including motivation and a clear comparison with related work. The camera-ready version of papers accepted for publication should be formatted using the ACM two-column conference template (available in LaTeX and Word) and should consist of up to 10 pages (excluding references and appendices).
In addition, we seek submissions of papers for presentation only. The purpose of this track is to enable authors to share timely, relevant, and significant research published in other venues. Papers accepted for this track will not appear in the symposium proceedings and can thus appear elsewhere. Presentations may also be based on demonstrations of innovative systems. We encourage authors who have recently published interdisciplinary papers in computer science or law venues to submit them to CS&Law as presentations. Recent or forthcoming work is strongly preferred.
It is stressed that presentation-only submissions are expected to be fully fledged submissions of the same general content and scope as papers submitted for publications. Submissions that consist only of abstracts, works in progress, or proposals for future work will not be considered for this track..
Papers submitted for presentation only may be in any format (including final published form for papers that have already been published elsewhere), but must consist of full papers in substantially complete form. Authors are cautioned that, as on the publication track, reviewers should be able to evaluate the paper’s contributions and novelty within the first 10 pages. (The introduction section of a standard law-review article is typically sufficient for this purpose.)
Papers associated with accepted presentations will be made available to symposium participants as a PDF, and the deadline for uploading these final versions is the same as the camera-ready deadline for papers accepted for publication.
We intend to have one or more “works in progress” sessions in which participants give presentations on ongoing research, with ample time for questions and discussions. Submissions of works in progress should consist of drafts that are sufficiently developed to enable fruitful discussion but that are preliminary enough to benefit from constructive feedback. Works in progress may be from any relevant discipline, may be of any length, and are not required to be formatted in any particular template.
Works in progress submissions will be due on January 14, 2025, and authors will be notified of acceptances and rejections on February 3, 2025. Drafts accepted for discussion will be circulated among symposium participants but not publicly posted and will be due on March 10, 2025. Submission instructions will be posted on the symposium website at a later date.
We also intend to have one or more “lightning-talk” sessions in which participants give very short talks on material that will not be published in the proceedings. Suitable topics include (but are not limited to) very recent or partial results, open problems, and announcements of computer science and law events and opportunities. Submissions should consist of abstracts only, with an optional link to the work, event, or other material the talk will refer to. Lightning-talk submissions will be due on March 10, 2025, and proposers will be notified of acceptances and rejections on March 17, 2025. Submission instructions will be posted on the symposium website at a later date.
General Chair: Katrina Ligett (Hebrew University)
Outgoing General Chair: Danny Weitzner (MIT)
Local Arrangements Chairs: Boris Paal (TUM) and Alexander Pretschner (TUM)
Program Committee Chairs: Ran Canetti (BU) and James Grimmelmann (Cornell)