Meet the Founder

Zhanna Lynne Shank, J.D.
Founder & CEO, Systems Ethics Advisory LLC

Zhanna is passionate about helping leaders navigate the ethical, strategic, and governance dimensions of emerging technologies.

With over a decade of experience across national security, academia, and international diplomacy, she brings a systems-level perspective to technology oversight and responsible innovation. Her expertise spans AI and autonomy, space systems, quantum computing, cyber risk, and digital governance. Zhanna’s analysis has appeared in leading media and academic outlets, including CNN, NBC News, BBC, POLITICO, Nature, and Physics Today.

Before founding Systems Ethics Advisory, Zhanna held senior roles in policy, research, and education. She has served as a professor of systems engineering at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, taught cyber warfare studies at the U.S. Air War College, and led cyber and space security initiatives at MITRE. She has advised organizations including DARPA, the U.S. State Department, the Department of Commerce, and the United Nations.

Zhanna is currently a professor with the United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR), where she teaches international humanitarian and emerging tech law to diplomats across five continents. She also serves as a Senior Associate (non-resident) at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) Strategic Technologies Program, and as a Non-Resident Fellow at the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research (UNIDIR).

A former U.S. Air Force Judge Advocate, Zhanna was commissioned through the MIT ROTC program. Her past fellowships include appointments with the Belfer Center’s Cyber Security Project at the Harvard Kennedy School, the Madeleine K. Albright Institute for Global Affairs, Duke University School of Law, Stanford University’s U.S.-Russia Forum, the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs, and the Army Cyber Institute at West Point.

Zhanna holds a J.D. from the University of California, Davis School of Law, where she specialized in cyberlaw. She earned an M.A. in War Studies from King’s College London and holds a B.A. in International Relations and Russian from Wellesley College. She also completed the Associate of King’s College (AKC), a certificate in theology, ethics, and philosophy.

Zhanna’s work continues to bridge technology, policy, and ethics to inform responsible innovation in an increasingly complex and contested global landscape.