Neil Netanel is Professor of Law at the University of California at Los Angeles and past Director of the UCLA’s Israel Studies Program. He teaches and writes in the areas of copyright, free speech, international intellectual property, and telecommunications law and policy. His recent books and book projects include Copyright's Paradox (Oxford University Press, 2008); The Development Agenda: Global Intellectual Property and Developing Countries (Neil Weinstock Netanel ed., Oxford University Press, 2008); From Maimonides to Microsoft: The Jewish Law of Copyright Since the Birth of Print (Oxford University Press, 2016); and Copyright: What Everyone Needs to Know (Oxford University Press, 2018). Professor Netanel joined the UCLA School of Law faculty in fall 2004, after serving for a decade on the faculty of the University of Texas at Austin School of Law, where he was the Arnold, White & Durkee Centennial Professor of Law.

Prior to entering academia, Professor Netanel practiced law in Israel for seven years with the Tel-Aviv firm, Yigal Arnon & Co., where he negotiated the contract with the architects for Israel’s Supreme Court building, represented Israel’s first cable television operator, shepherded numerous joint ventures with Israeli high-tech companies, and served on Israel’s Ministry of Justice Copyright Law Revision Committee. He also worked for a year as Assistant to the General Counsel of the State of Israel's Environmental Protection Service. Professor Netanel now teaches regularly in Israel. He has taught courses at the law schools of Haifa University, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and Tel-Aviv University.

He received his B.A. from Yale University (1976), J.D. from UC Berkeley Boalt Hall School of Law (1980), and J.S.D. from Stanford University (1998).