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Tonya M. Evans is an attorney, author, educator, and strategic advisor at the intersection of law, technology, and finance. She is the Founder and CEO of Advantage Evans Global Regulatory Strategies, where she provides compliance advisory and executive education services for financial institutions, fintech companies, and regulatory bodies navigating the digital asset economy.
Tonya serves on the Board of Directors of Digital Currency Group (DCG), one of the world's most influential blockchain investment firms, and previously served as Chairperson of the Maker Ecosystem Growth Foundation, leading governance and regulatory strategy for one of the most significant decentralized finance protocols in the ecosystem. She testified before the U.S. House Financial Services Subcommittee on Digital Assets and has advised regulators including the Central Bank of Nigeria and Ghana's Securities and Exchange Commission and Bank of Ghana on virtual asset service provider (VASP) frameworks.
Her academic career spans nearly two decades across three law schools. She served as a tenured Full Professor of Law at Penn State Dickinson Law (2020–2025), where she also held a joint appointment with the Penn State Institute for Computational & Data Sciences. As Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and Professor of Law at UNH Franklin Pierce School of Law (2017–2020), she created and directed the first Blockchain, Cryptocurrency & Law Online Certificate Program at any U.S. law school. Earlier, she spent a decade at Widener University Commonwealth Law School as Associate Professor of Law and Associate Dean for Inclusion & Equity (2008–2017), teaching Intellectual Property, Wills, Trusts & Estates, and Entertainment Law. She currently maintains an adjunct appointment at Penn State Dickinson Law.
Before entering academia, Tonya practiced law in Philadelphia — clerking for the Honorable Theodore McKee on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, then working at Pepper Hamilton LLP and Drinker Biddle & Reath LLP in trusts and estate planning before founding her own firm, TME Law & Evans Borden Evans, LLC, where she advised clients on intellectual property, entertainment law, and municipal finance.
Tonya is a Forbes Contributor covering fintech, intellectual property, and leadership, and hosts "Confidently Crypto" on SiriusXM's Financially Speaking podcast. She is the author of Digital Money Demystified: Go From Cash to Crypto Safely, Legally and Confidently and Electing Crypto, as well as earlier titles for writers and creatives including Copyright Companion for Writers, Contracts Companion for Writers, and Literary Law Guide for Authors. Her scholarly contributions include a chapter on blockchain and the disintermediation of music in the Oxford Handbook of Music Law and Policy.
Committed to supporting the next generation of lawyers and professionals entering the digital economy, Tonya founded Web3 Ready, an initiative dedicated to equipping law students and lawyers with the knowledge, skills, and strategic positioning needed to thrive in fintech, blockchain, and digital asset practice areas. The initiative includes Beyond the JD, a summer cohort-based program designed to help legal professionals accelerate their transition into the Web3 economy (ProfTonyaEvans.com/beyondthejd).
Tonya earned her J.D. cum laude from Howard University School of Law, where she served as Editor-in-Chief of the Howard Law Journal, and her B.S. in Communication Studies from Northwestern University on a full four-year athletic scholarship in tennis. She is admitted to the bar in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, the District of Columbia, and New York.
Information on additional publications is available online at https://proftonyaevans.com/publications/.
Information on additional events and media is available online at https://proftonyaevans.com/presentations/.
Contributor, United States GAO Study: Technology Assessment–Emerging Technology Offers Benefits for Some Applications but Faces Challenges (2022).
The Genesis of Creative Justice: Disintermediating Creativity, 26 Lewis & Clark Law Review 3 (2022).
De-Gentrified Black Genius: Blockchain, Copyright & the Disintermediation of Creativity, 49 Pepperdine L. Rev. 101 (2022).
The Role of International Rules in Blockchain-Based Cross-Border Disputes, 65 Wayne State Law Rev. 1 (2019)
CryptoKitties, Cryptography, and Copyright (August 2019, BYU Copyright and Trademark Symposium Issue of the American Intellectual Property Law Association Quarterly Journal, 47 AIPLA 2, 2019)
User "Safe Harbor" from Statutory Damages: Remixing the DOC’s IP Task Force White Paper. San Diego Law Review. 54:79-116. 2017
Statutory Heirs Apparent?: Reclaiming Copyright in the Age of Author-Controlled, Author-Benefiting Transfers. West Virginia Law Review. 297-343. 2016
Hip Hop and the Law 2015
Reverse Engineering IP. Marquette Intellectual Property Law Review. 17:61-101. 2013
Safe Harbor for the Innocent Infringer in the Digital Age. Willamette Law Review. 50:1-42. 2013
Sampling, Looping, and Mashing Oh My: How Hip Hop Music is Scratching More than the Surface of Copyright Law. Fordham Intellectual Property, Media and Entertainment Law Journal. 21:843-904. 2010
Contracts companion for writers 2007
Copyright companion for writers 2007
Intellectual property law institute. 2007
Literary law guide for authors: copyright, trademark, and contracts in plain language 2005
FYOS literary law primer: from writer to literary entrepreneur 2003
In the Title IX Race Toward Gender Equity, The Black Female Athlete is Left to Finish Last: The Lack of Access for the “Invisible Woman". Howard law journal. 42:105-128. 1998
A Call to Action: The Time Has Come to Revisit and Reform the Law of Ideas. Intellectual Property Law Newsletter (ABA Intellectual Property law Section).
CryptoKitties, Cryptography, and Copyright. American Intellectual Property Law Association Quarterly Journal.
Works in Progress
Decode the Future (course and companion book)
NFT Law Guide to the Future of Creativity (course and companion book)
Inheriting Digital Scarcity: Planning for a Bitcoin Estate
Managing Digital Scarcity: Blockchain Use Cases for Digital Rights Management
The Building Block(chains) of the Orphan Works Solution
Digital Currency Group’s Board of Directors
Member
2021 Forbes Over 50 Listee (Investment category)
2021 awardee of the Fastcase 50 list
American Bar Association’s Legal Technology Resource Center Women of Legal Tech list
Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated
Member
American Bar Association’s Legal Technology Resource Center’s Women of Legal Tech 2022 list
Maker DAO’s Maker Ecosystem Growth Foundation
Chairperson (2020-2021)
World Economic Forum/Wharton DAO Project Series Working Group
Member (2022-present)
United States GAO Study on Blockchain
Contributor (2022)
NFT Black Art
Senior Advisor, (2021-present)
Maxwell Frost (2022 U.S. Congressional Candidate, CD Florida 10)
Advisor
Bermuda Global FinTech Advisory Board
Member (2018-present)
Global Blockchain Business Council
Observing Member
Emerging Impact
Advisor (2021-present)
The Pinkwellchick Foundation, Inc.
Founding member and founding Chair
Co-host, television special at Consensus 2023: Banking on Crypto
Speaker, Financial Literacy Education Commission’s digital asset group at CFTC, online (October 31, 2022)
Speaker, FUTURELand Cleveland with US Rep. Shontel Brown (fireside sponsored by Circle), online, (October 28, 2022)
Keynote, Blockchain for Social Good, San Francisco, California (October 20-21, 2022)
Speaker, Black Enterprise, Future of Financial Services Summit Panel, New York, New York (July 21, 2022)
Keynote, HUBSPOT, online (July 20, 2022)
Speaker, Society of Corporate Governance, Chicago, Illinois (June 22, 2022)
Keynote, RL Bank/Cayman Keynote (virtual) (June 8, 2022)
Discussant, Senator Cory Booker Virtual Assets Roundtable with Black and LatinX Industry Leaders, online (May 18, 2022)
Panelist, NFTs, Blockchain Technologies, and the Metaverse, Licensing Executives Society (LES)-NY (April 27, 2022)
Panelist, “Blockchain Arbitration and the Resolution of Cryptocurrency Disputes,” Paris Arbitration Week, Paris, France (April 1, 2022)
Speaker, ABA Business Law Section Meeting, Atlanta, Georgia (March 31, 2022)
Speaker, Harvard Blockchain Conference, Boston, Massachusetts (March 26-27, 2022)
Keynote, Program on Information Justice & Intellectual Property, American University Washington College of Law (March 25, 2022)
Keynote, Washington Heads of Office Leadership Council meeting (March 17, 2022)
Speaker, “Metaverse Streaming House”, Piksel, Austin, Texas (March 13, 2022)
Speaker, Crime, Cryptocurrency, and the Revolution to Confront Colonialism, Revolt.tv Black News with Eboni K. Williams, Esq. (December 9, 2021)
Panelist, What the Future Holds for NFTs, American Bar Association Blockchain and Digital Currency Institute (September 15, 2021)
Athena Award — Academic Leadership
EDGE in Tech Symposium (2023)
