Expertise
Deirdre Crowley is a Partner in our Commercial Litigation Group, specialising in emerging technology law. Deirdre’s practice is focused on the digital economy, with a particular emphasis on Data Protection, Cyber and Artificial Intelligence.
Deirdre is current holder of the prestigious EMEA WIB Data Protection and Privacy Lawyer of the Year 2023 award and is shortlisted for this award once again in 2024. She is a leading authority on GDPR and represents many clients in their dealings with the Data Protection Commission, including in relation to regulatory investigations resulting from cyber incidents, data subject access complaints and own volition inquiries.
Deirdre’s practice is primarily focused on technological innovation and digitalisation related advices. She acts for many of the world’s highest profile companies, spanning across sectors ranging from social media platforms, technology, pharma, medical devices manufacturing multinational companies to government departments and regulatory bodies.
Deirdre’s practice includes contentious and non-contentious work, making her a trusted advisor of many in respect of their compliance, governance and related contentious defence litigation work.
Deirdre is also a partner in Matheson’s Digital Economy Group and together with specialists from our financial institutions group, competition and regulation group and our technology and innovation group, Deirdre is working with clients to deal with the wave of new regulatory compliance obligations coming from Europe in the Digital Markets, Cyber and Artificial Intelligence space.
A highly sought after conference speaker, Deirdre is frequently invited to speak at key industry and academic events.
Deirdre is a guest lecturer on UCC’s LLM course in Tech and Elaw and the Law Society of Ireland’s Data Protection courses. Deirdre is a voluntary member of the Crawford Art Gallery’s Law and Finance Committee.
Recent areas of experience highlights include:
- Advising many of the world’s largest technology companies headquartered in Ireland in respect of their GDPR, cyber-security and artificial intelligence governance programmes.
- Drafting cyber and data protection incident response and crisis management policies and procedures, training board and leadership teams on the legal aspects of data security incidents.
- Representing global online platform and technology companies in regulatory inquiries, including Data Protection Inquiries.
- Representing clients in high stakes litigation, including procuring urgent High Court injunctive relief in cases involving the theft of commercial data and court relief for multinational companies in the context of emerging technology law.
- Leading and coordinating high profile cyber incident response teams, dealing with parallel reporting obligations, third party vendor management and engaging with the Data Protection Commission, An Garda Siochana, the National Cyber Security Centre, Interpol and Europol.
- Advising on post cyber incident commercial disputes and large-scale contentious and non-contentious data subject access complaints.
- Advising many leading online platforms and hosting providers in relation to their obligations under the Digital Services Act, the Online Media and Regulation Act and emerging laws governing Artificial Intelligence, ethics, compliance and governance. This includes advising on content moderation rules, content take down obligations, law enforcement response procedures, compliance, audit functions and adtech regulation.
- Advising on the drafting of legislation in the data protection context, including drafting legislation relevant to government departments, regulatory bodies and government authorities.
- Advising organisations on Data Subject Access Request complaints, particularly in the context of employment litigation, Data Protection Commission Inquiries and GDPR litigation.
- Admitted as a solicitor in Ireland, 2003
- Diploma in Employment Law, University College Dublin, 2004
- CIPPA, Privacy and Data Protection, International Association of Privacy Practitioners, 2017