Associate Corporate Counsel, IP (Copyright)

Snapshot

Google DeepMind is looking for an enthusiastic IP specialist to join the GDM Legal Team.  This is a heavily copyright-focused role centered around providing guidance across multiple jurisdictions as applied to AI model training and outputs, dataset collection and use, open source, ML research, product development and copyright policy and advocacy, with particular focus on the EU AI Act and emerging legislation in the field. 

The Google DeepMind Legal team provides proactive and strategic legal counseling to accelerate Google DeepMind’s best-in-class research and support global product development and release.

About Us

At Google DeepMind, we are a team of scientists, engineers, ethicists, and more, working to build the next generation of AI systems safely and responsibly.  From AlphaFold to Gemini, our research underpins the flourishing AI industry we see today.  We've built a unique culture and work environment where long-term ambitious research can flourish, and where product development and integration can lead to adoption by billions of users.  We closely partner with Google teams to bring AI into many Google products and services.  We are located in numerous countries, and comprise a group of dedicated individuals diverse in both backgrounds and experiences.

The Role

• We are seeking a qualified lawyer to join our in-house legal team. This is a unique opportunity for a lawyer who is passionate about the intersection of intellectual property and artificial intelligence.  You will work across jurisdictions, advising research and product teams on data acquisition, model training, and the deployment of generative AI tools.  You will serve as a bridge between complex legal frameworks (like the EU AI Act) and technical reality, ensuring our models are built on a foundation of legal integrity, and legal policies are built on technical practicalities.  

Key responsibilities: 

• Advise research and engineering teams on copyright and data usage issues related to the training, tuning, and deployment of both task-specific and general Large Language Models (LLMs) and other AI systems and components.
• Monitor and interpret evolving AI and copyright regulations, with a specific focus on the EU AI Act (including General Purpose AI obligations under Art. 53), the EU Digital Single Market Directive (TDM exceptions), and US Copyright Office guidance.
• Support and develop AI compliance efforts and reporting requirements, including the requirements of the EU AI Act and its Code of Practice, for both the model and the data levels.
• Support policies and practices for handling datasets, including assisting with reviews and vetting of datasets for legal risk, ensuring compliance with appropriate copyright regulations and exceptions (e.g., fair use, TDM), opt-out protocols (e.g., robots.txt), and licensing terms.
• Partner with policy, ethics, and technical teams to translate legal requirements into actionable technical guardrails for GDM and the industry.
• Support the drafting and negotiations of complex licensing agreements and content partnerships.
• Support the evaluation and applications of open source licenses to both incoming and outgoing code and data.

About You

In order to set you up for success at Google DeepMind,  we look for the following skills and experience:

Requirements: 

• J.D., LLM or equivalent degree, and a valid license to practice law in the relevant jurisdiction (US attorney or UK Solicitor/Barrister).
• Minimum of 4 years of relevant legal experience, including:
• Strong familiarity with copyright issues that are at the heart of the public and government debate around AI and its regulatory and policy landscapes in at least the US, UK and EU.
• Identifying, developing and providing analyses and guidance to project leadership in the context of such copyright issues.  
• Legal counseling at key decision points in the AI lifecycle.
• Experience working with and providing regular guidance to front-line technical clients, and collaboratively working in a legal team setting on large, complex issues and in evolving areas of law.
• At least basic familiarity with the technical workings of AI systems and processes such as ML training, model architectures and serving lifecycles.  Additional familiarity with web search and web architectures and related technology is a plus.
• Strong communicator, able to flex your communication style to reach different audiences, particularly the technical community and high-level management.
• In addition, the following would be an advantage: Additional experience with one or more of supporting government reporting and compliance requirements, developing and making policy recommendations, supporting strategic research and product development efforts using a risk-based framework, and in-house experience is a plus.

The US base salary range for this full-time position is between $210,000 - $312,000+ bonus + equity + benefits. Your recruiter can share more about the specific salary range for your targeted location during the hiring process.

Application deadline: 

Note: In the event your application is successful and an offer of employment is made to you, any offer of employment will be conditional on the results of a background check, performed by a third party acting on our behalf. For more information on how we handle your data, please see our Applicant and Candidate Privacy Policy

At Google DeepMind, we value diversity of experience, knowledge, backgrounds and perspectives and harness these qualities to create extraordinary impact. We are committed to equal employment opportunity regardless of sex, race, religion or belief, ethnic or national origin, disability, age, citizenship, marital, domestic or civil partnership status, sexual orientation, gender identity, pregnancy, or related condition (including breastfeeding) or any other basis as protected by applicable law. If you have a disability or additional need that requires accommodation, please do not hesitate to let us know.

In-house legal team supporting AI research and product development.