Latanya Sweeney, a distinguished AI fairness and privacy researcher at Harvard University, has been named to the TIME100 AI 2025 list. This year's list features individuals whom TIME recognizes for making significant contributions to technology.
Sweeney holds the title of Daniel Paul Professor of the Practice of Government and Technology at the Harvard Kennedy School. She is the director and founder of the Public Interest Tech Lab within the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences and serves as editor-in-chief of Technology Science.
Additionally, she founded the Data Privacy Lab and previously served as chief technology officer at the U.S. Federal Trade Commission.
Sweeney is also a Distinguished Career Professor of Computer Science, Technology, and Policy at Carnegie Mellon University.
With three patents and over 100 academic publications, Sweeney has pioneered the field of data privacy, launched the emerging area of algorithmic fairness.
Her work is explicitly cited in two U.S. regulations, including the federal medical privacy regulation known as HIPAA.
She is a recipient of the prestigious Louis D. Brandeis Privacy Award and the American Psychiatric Association's Privacy Advocacy Award, and she is an elected fellow of the American College of Medical Informatics. Sweeney has also testified before government bodies worldwide.
She earned her PhD in computer science from MIT in 2001, making her the first Black woman to achieve this, and she completed her undergraduate degree in computer science at Harvard University.
Dr. Sweeney develops and utilizes technology to examine and address societal, political, and governance issues, teaching others to do the same.
Her recent work focuses on technology tools to enhance electoral processes, analyses of social media platforms, and innovative privacy paradigms.
Furthermore, Dr. Sweeney is helping to pioneer a new field known as public interest technology.
From the African continent, notable figures include Bosun Tijani, Minister of Communications, Innovation, and Digital Economy in Nigeria; Paula Ingabire, Minister of ICT and Innovation in Rwanda; Mfikeyo Makayi, CEO of Kobold Metals Africa; and Strive Masiyiwa, founder and executive chairman of Cassava Technologies.