Alex Alben is a technology executive and privacy expert, who served as Washington State’s first Chief Privacy Officer from 2015 to 2019.  In that capacity, he worked on consumer privacy legislation and coordinated privacy and data policy for state and local government.  As one of only five Chief Privacy Officers in the country, Alex initiated statewide programs for enhanced privacy training, consumer education and legal compliance.  In March of 2017, Gov Tech Magazine named him one of the country’s top “Doers, Dreamers and Drivers” in state government.

As a technology executive for over 20 years, Alex worked for start-ups founded by Paul Allen and Bill Gates.  At Starwave Corp., he helped launch ESPN.com and ABCNews.com, and served for six years in senior management at RealNetworks, where he supervised the award-winning “RealJukebox” music management software product.

A graduate of Stanford University and Stanford Law School, Alben writes about the intersection of media, technology and politics. He is the author of Analog Days—How Technology Rewrote Our Future.  He teaches the Privacy Law section of the Tech Policy Law Clinic at the University of Washington School of law and lectures frequently about privacy and security issues.

He has expertise in cybersecurity and international privacy.