Stavroula Karapapa is a Professor of Intellectual Property and Information Law at the School of Law of the University of Essex. Karapapa has held the Chair of Intellectual Property and Information Law and Executive Directorship of the Centre of Commercial Law and Financial Regulation at the University of Reading; she has also taught at Brunel Law School, where she was also the deputy Director of the Intellectual Property, Internet and Media Research Centre. Before joining the academia, she was a legal practitioner, specialising in intellectual property, commercial and civil law. 

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Karapapa is visiting research fellow at the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies (2020/21); adjunct Professor at the University of London (PGLaws, 2019-); Sessional Lecturer at the University of Reading (2020-); Editor-in-Chief of the European Trade Mark Reports (Sweet & Maxwell, 2015-); UK Correspondent for Kluwer EU Copyright Cases (Kluwer, 2011-); and Greek-qualified Barrister (Athens Bar). ​

Karapapa writes and teaches about the challenges that digital technologies pose for existing legal regimes, particularly intellectual property law and digital rights. She is interested in the legal regulation of digital networked environments, big data, and artificial intelligence (in particular machine learning) and has focused much of her career on how the law has sought to regulate and otherwise shape information technology—as well as the impact of information technology on the law. Her work is distinctive in its socio-legal and comparative outlook and often involves doctrinal analysis at the interface of other disciplines.​

Her work has been cited in UK Intellectual Property Office draft legislation, Opinions of the Advocate General, and official reports of the European Commission, the Canadian Privacy Commissioner, and the US Copyright Office. She offers expert opinion to the UK Intellectual Property Office and the European Commission on issues related to copyright law reform since 2012.

In her most recent book, Defences to Copyright Infringement: Creativity, Innovation and Freedom on the Internet (OUP, 2020) she develops a coherent theoretical and doctrinal framework for copyright defences and offers normative insights and policy recommendations. Her other books include: Copyright and Mass Digitization (OUP, 2013, with Maurizio Borghi) and Private Copying (Routledge, 2012). ​

Karapapa has also pioneered the problem-based approach in legal education by having published a textbook on Intellectual Property Law (OUP, 2019, with Luke McDonagh), which encourages students to engage with each topic through relevant, real-world issues and gain insight into how the law interacts with everyday life and business. 

You can find her work on ResearchGate ​and SSRN.