David Turetsky is a visiting assistant professor at the College of Emergency Preparedness, Homeland Security and Cybersecurity at the University at Albany. He brings more than 35 years of experience, including senior roles in business, government, and law. Immediately before joining the University at Albany, he was based in Washington D.C., where he co-led the cybersecurity, privacy and data protection practice at global law firm Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP, and engaged with businesses and industry association clients in diverse industries on a broad range of related legal and policy issues. In addition to winning professional recognition, he serves as a member of the American Bar Association's Cybersecurity Legal Task Force, co-leads the privacy and security working group of the Information Sharing and Analysis Organization Standards Organization created pursuant to an Executive Order issued by President Obama, and was co-chair of the Federal Communications Bar Association's Emergency Preparedness and Homeland Security Committee.

Before joining Akin Gump, Mr. Turetsky served as a senior leader at the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), for most of his tenure as Chief of the Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau, where he led cybersecurity policy for the FCC, including its public-private efforts and its engagement in Obama interagency cybersecurity work led by the White House and other agencies. He also led the FCC’s efforts regarding emergency communications and related emergency preparedness and homeland security issues, working closely with stakeholders and other government agencies, and oversaw the FCC’s continuity of operations program. He served briefly as Deputy Chief of the FCC’s International Bureau. In business, Mr. Turetsky served as a senior officer of a telecommunications services start-up that he helped to grow and bring public; and twice served as Management Trustee while in private law practice, appointed by federal courts on the recommendation of the Bush Department of Justice, to manage all aspects of mobile wireless service businesses in a total of 20 mostly rural markets under merger consent decrees until those businesses were divested (about 6 months each time). In the Clinton Administration, Mr. Turetsky served as a Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Antitrust in the U.S. Department of Justice, with special responsibility for competition enforcement and policy issues affecting regulated industries, in the U.S. and abroad.

Mr. Turetsky has a J.D. from the University of Chicago School of Law, studied at the London School of Economics and Political Science, and has a B.A., magna cum laude, from Amherst College. He writes and speaks often, and has frequently been quoted in the press.

CEHC Research Interests

Cybersecurity— policy, regulation, public-private partnerships, information sharing, market incentives, international engagement, national security policy, elections, etc; and emergency communications, including many aspects of the 9-1-1 system, wireless emergency alerts, network reliability and resilience, FirstNet, etc.