Sneha Revanur
AI regulation activist
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Sneha Revanur (born 2004) is an American activist. She is the founder and president of Encode, an organization advocating for the regulation of artificial intelligence.
Sneha Revanur | |
|---|---|
| Born | 2004 (age 21–22) |
| Education | Williams College, Stanford University |
| Years active | 2020–present |
| Organization | Encode |
Early life and education
Revanur was born and raised in San Jose, California, where she attended Evergreen Valley High School and was a delegate to the United States Senate Youth Program.[1][2]
Revanur attended Williams College before transferring to Stanford University.[3][4]
Activism
In 2023, Revanur led a coalition of youth-led organizations to send a joint letter to congressional leaders and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy calling for the inclusion of young people on AI oversight and advisory boards.[5][6] She has stated that the project was sparked by concerns around the impact of generative AI on society following the release of GPT-4. Later that year, Revanur was the youngest participant on a roundtable of civil society leaders convened to discuss threats posed by AI.[7][8]
Encode
Revanur founded Encode at age fifteen, after coming across California Proposition 25, a ballot measure that would have replaced the use of cash bail statewide with pretrial risk assessment algorithms.[9][10][11] After Proposition 25 failed to pass, Revanur broadened Encode's focus to include other societal challenges related to AI use, including surveillance, disinformation, and job loss.[12]
Revanur is now primarily focused on the possibility of larger-scale "catastrophic" risks from AI.[13] Citing a lack of federal action on AI regulation, Encode has shifted its attention to passing state-level legislation[14], most notably co-sponsoring the highly controversial SB 1047 and its successor SB 53 in California[15] and helping push for the RAISE Act in New York[16]. The organization has consistently opposed federal preemption of state AI safety laws.[17][18]
In December 2024, Encode filed an amicus brief in Musk v. Altman to oppose the for-profit conversion of OpenAI, originally founded as a non-profit.[19] In October 2025, Encode general counsel Nathan Calvin shared that he and Encode had received a subpoena from OpenAI, which requested communications that would implicate a connection to Elon Musk.[20]
Awards and honors
In 2023, Revanur was the youngest individual named to TIME's inaugural list of the 100 most influential people in artificial intelligence.[10]
In December 2024, she was included on the BBC's 100 Women list.[21]
Revanur was featured in the 2026 documentary The AI Doc: Or How I Became an Apocaloptimist.[22]