Ian Ballon



Ian Ballon is an intellectual property and internet litigator who is the Co-Chair of Greenberg Traurig LLP’s Global Intellectual Property & Technology Practice Group. He represents clients in copyright, DMCA, trademark, trade secret, right of publicity, privacy, security, software, database and Internet- and mobile-related disputes and in the defense of data privacy, cybersecurity breach, adtech and behavioral advertising, TCPA and other Internet-related class action suits. Please click here to view a list of some of his recent cases.

Mr. Ballon, who splits his time between the firm’s Silicon Valley, L.A., and D.C. offices, is the author of the five-volume legal treatise, E-Commerce and Internet Law: Treatise With Forms 2d Edition (West 2008 & 2022 Cum. Supp., www.ianballon.net) and the earlier first edition, which has been cited in state and federal court opinions. In addition, he serves as the Executive Director of Stanford University Law School’s Center for the Digital Economy. He also chairs PLI’s annual Advanced Defending Data Privacy, Cybersecurity Breach and TCPA Class Action Litigation conference. Mr. Ballon previously served as an advisor to ALI’s Intellectual Property: Principles Governing Jurisdiction, Choice of Law, and Judgments in Transactional Disputes (ALI Principles of the Law 2007) and was a member of the consultative group for the Data Privacy Principles of Law project (ALI Principles of the Law Data Privacy, 2020).

Mr. Ballon was named the Lawyer of the Year for Information Technology Law in the 2022, 2021, 2020, 2019, 2018, 2016, and 2013 editions of Best Lawyers in America and was recognized as the 2012 New Media Lawyer of the Year by the Century City Bar Association. In 2022, 2021, 2020, 2019, and 2018 he was recognized as one of the Top 1,000 trademark attorneys in the world for his litigation practice by World Trademark Review. In addition, in 2019 he was named one of the top 20 Cybersecurity lawyers in California and in 2018 one of the Top Cybersecurity/Artificial Intelligence lawyers in California by the Los Angeles and San Francisco Daily Journal. He received the “Trailblazer” Award, Intellectual Property, 2017 from The National Law Journal and he has been recognized as a “Groundbreaker” in The Recorder’s 2017 Litigation Departments of the Year Awards for winning a series of TCPA cases. In addition, he was the recipient of the California State Bar Intellectual Property Law section’s Vanguard Award for significant contributions to the development of intellectual property law. He is listed in Legal 500 U.S., The Best Lawyers in America (in the areas of information technology and intellectual property) and Chambers and Partners USA Guide in the areas of privacy and data security and information technology.

He has been recognized as one of the Top 75 intellectual property litigators in California by the Los Angeles and San Francisco Daily Journal in every year that the list has been published (2009 through 2022). He was also listed in Variety’s “Legal Impact Report: 50 Game-Changing Attorneys” (2012), was recognized as one of the Top 100 lawyers in California by the Los Angeles and San Francisco Daily Journal L.A., as one of the Top 100 lawyers in Los Angeles by the Los Angeles Business Journal and has appeared on both the Northern California and Southern California Super Lawyers lists.

Mr. Ballon is admitted to practice in state and federal courts in California, the District of Columbia, and Maryland, federal court in Colorado, and before the U.S. Supreme Court and multiple U.S. Circuit Courts of Appeal.

He has also been elected to membership in the American Law Institute and holds the CIPP/US certification from the International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP).