Section 230 Protections: Can Legal Revisions or Novel Technologies Limit Online Misinformation and Abuse A Workshop | National Academies
A planning committee of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine will convene a workshop to discuss whether protections provided to Internet-based technology companies and social media platforms under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (CDA) of 1996 should be reconsidered in light of increasing online misinformation and abuse. The workshop will examine […]
What is Stronger Than Hate? Lessons from Testimony, Media, and Scholarship | Shorenstein Center
Panel Discussion: Media scholars and experts on how to combat the rise of hate and the disinformation that spreads it. How can we learn from lessons of the past to stop hate movements today? What role does the media play in stopping the spread of hateful ideologies? How are disinformation and media manipulation used as […]
Sociology Lecture Series: Ruha Benjamin, “Race to the Future? Reimagining the Default Settings of Technology & Society” | The New School
From everyday apps to complex algorithms, technology has the potential to hide, speed, and deepen discrimination, while appearing neutral and even benevolent when compared to racist practices of a previous era. In this talk, Ruha Benjamin explores a range of discriminatory designs that encode inequity — what she terms the “New Jim Code.” This presentation […]
Prototyping Feminist AI | Stanford University HAI
How can feminist methodologies and approaches be applied and be transformative when developing AI and ADM systems? How can AI innovation and social systems innovation be catalysed concomitantly to create a positive movement for social change larger than the sum of the data science or social science parts? How can we produce actionable research that […]
“News you don’t believe”: User perspectives on f*ke news and misinformation | Shorenstein Center
Users’ perspectives on what f*ke news and misinformation is and isn’t, who drives it, and where people say they see it are important for understanding the scale and scope of public concern, and how this corresponds with research insights and aligns with proposed responses to these problems, as well as for the credibility and even […]
Cybersecurity in 2021 and Beyond: The Aftermath of the SolarWinds Attack | Georgetown University
In December 2020, it was first reported that SolarWinds, a major US information technology firm, experienced a massive cyberattack which affected up to 18,000 clients, including numerous US government agencies and Fortune 500 companies whose networks and data were exposed and vulnerable for months. Described by Microsoft’s president Brad Smith, one of the affected clients, […]
AI, Autonomous Systems and Espionage: The Coming Revolution in Intelligence Affairs | Georgetown University
f–field f–eyebrow f–field f–page-title cc–component-container cc–intro Artificial Intelligence and autonomous systems are poised to transform the practice of espionage. This “revolution in intelligence affairs” will lead to machines serving as more than just tools for collection and analysis, but as intelligence consumers, decision-makers, and targets of intelligence operations. Former National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency Chief Technology Officer […]
The Oxford Internet Institute @ 20 | The Oxford Internet Institute
This 1 hour online panel discussion to mark the 20th Anniversary of the OII brings together a unique gathering of the current and former Directors of the OII. Given their experience in leading the helm of the Institute they will reflect on what the OII has achieved and what pressing technology challenges this community can […]
Challenges and Considerations for Misinformation Research | Center for an Informed Public
The Center for an Informed Public at the University of Washington is planning a virtual workshop, “Challenges and Considerations for Misinformation Research,” on May 6 that will bring together academic teams researching mis- and disinformation to reflect on research best practices, data ethics and hurdles, and the normative and epistemological foundations of our collective work. The CIP invites academic […]
Foresight and Decolonial Humanitarian Tech Ethics | Berkman Klein Center
Can humanitarian actors play a more intentional role in designing just and equitable digital futures? Could we, in fact, design worlds that don’t imagine some figures, particularly populations that we serve in the global south, to merely be passive beneficiaries and outside of the borders of expertise we seek? Instead of looking at digital governance […]
United Facts of America: A Festival of Fact-Checking | Poynter
Facts took a bit of a beating in 2020. Let’s turn the page and celebrate the truth! United Facts of America, brought to you by PolitiFact and the Poynter Institute, is a celebration of fact-checking featuring some of the most important voices in media, health care, politics and technology. Over 10 hours of virtual programming, […]
Reimagine the Internet | Knight First Amendment Institute
Reimagine the Internet is a virtual conference co-hosted by the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University and the soon-to-be-launched Institute for Digital Public Infrastructure at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. In six sessions over five days, there will be more than a dozen speakers whose work hints at what the internet could become over […]
Assembly Project Fellowship Showcase | Berkman Klein Center
This January, to celebrate the fifth year of the Assembly program, we invited five ongoing alumni project teams to return (virtually) to the Berkman Klein Center to participate in the Assembly Project Fellowship. These projects address the variety of topics that Assembly has tackled since its inception in 2017, including the ethics and governance of […]
2021 Tech and Racial Equity Conference: Anti-Racist Technologies for a Just Future | Center for Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity
Rapidly developing technologies can be an unprecedented force for good, but too often codify and amplify existing forms of racial inequality, discrimination, and bias. This free, online conference brings together researchers, policymakers, technologists, and advocates to address technology’s new threats to racial equity and new tools for a more just future. The conference is sponsored […]
Professor Deen Freelon in conversation with Felix M. Simon | Oxford Internet Institute
Deen Freelon is an associate professor in the School of Media and Journalism. His research covers two major areas of scholarship: 1) political expression through digital media and 2) data science and computational methods for analyzing large digital datasets. He has authored or co-authored more than 30 journal articles, book chapters and public reports, in […]
Racialized Disinformation and Real World Consequences | NetGain
In the wake of heightened online radicalization over the past several years, including the rise of far-right nationalism, violence, and harms to democracy globally, it is clear that technology platforms are playing an outsized role in amplifying racialized disinformation and fomenting real world consequences. As lawmakers and civil society grapple with the policy and legal […]
The Future of Democracy Ep. 41: The role of race in American political views | Knight Foundation
While the last year has seen broad-based calls for racial equity in the United States, protests often don’t always translate into policy outcomes. On Episode 41 of “The Future of Democracy,” Knight’s Evette Alexander will take a deep dive into how racial attitudes affect American political preferences with Dr. David C. Wilson, incoming dean of […]
OxDEG: Exploring the Flat Earth: Beliefs, Identity, and Rationality | Oxford Internet Institute
In this seminar Dr. Krafft will report on a mixed methods study of the North American Flat Earther community, drawing on documents from two Flat Earth Society websites, three surveys, and participant observation at the 2018 Flat Earth International Conference. Across the three surveys they find that around 20-30% of respondents are at least to […]
How to Save Ourselves From Disinformation, a Times Event | The New York Times
You’ve seen it. That meme that seems just too good to be true. That outlandish story your family member prefaced with, “Can you believe he said that?” followed by a video link of unknown origin and vintage. We are in an era of misinformation — and even disinformation, when someone intentionally disseminates false or misleading […]
Police Violence, Racial Injustice, and the Press: Reflections on Coverage of the Chauvin Trial | Shorenstein Center
The trial of Derek Chauvin sparked national conversations about violent policing and racial injustice. In its wake, how should policy makers, police, and journalists respond? The New Yorker staff writer Jelani Cobb (Spring 2018 Shorenstein Writer in Residence) and BBC correspondent Tara McKelvey (Fall 2012 Shorenstein Fellow) — who both covered the trial from Minneapolis — will join […]
An OSoMe Tool: Tracking Online (Mis)information | R Street
The rise of social media platforms has introduced another widespread phenomenon—the spread of misleading information. Whether introduced organically or deliberately, misinformation threatens the integrity of democratic journalism. Because misinformation has become a serious threat to governance, it requires interdisciplinary efforts and collaboration to mitigate. To this end, Indiana University’s Observatory on Social Media (OSoMe) researches […]
Deepfakes, Disinformation, and Democracy | ITIF
The media has long played an important role in a healthy democracy, providing citizens with access to accurate news and information that allows them to effectively participate in democratic processes. However, the growing threat from deepfakes and disinformation, from both foreign and domestic sources, threatens to overwhelm the ability of individuals to discern fact from […]
Movement Building and Grassroots Power: Mobilizing Communities of Color to Address Mis/Disinformation | NetGain Partnership
A discussion exploring the critical role that grassroots organizing and field-building must play in 2021 and beyond to address mis/disinformation with a particular focus on mobilizing communities of color. This webinar will explore how grassroots groups and communities of color can shape US federal policy and hold lawmakers accountable, the importance of grassroots pressure on […]
Fake news and the assault on truth | The Guardian
The John Rylands Research Institute and Library, part of The University of Manchester, holds the entire archive of the Manchester Guardian. In this series of events to mark our bicentenary, our panels of special guests and experts will each discuss an item from the archive, its relevance to today’s news and media, and how it […]
Grief x Healing x Innovation | Rights x Tech
Event Listing Header Rights x Tech is a space is for leaders in technology, movement and philanthropy who understand the importance of hearing from practitioners and leaders who understand how tech is touching all of our lives. We host monthly forums that are focused on sourcing innovation from the innovators already among us. Our upcoming […]
IDeaS Summer Institute | Center for Informed Democracy & Social – cybersecurity
The IDeaS Summer Institute is an intense, hands-on training camp that teaches participants about the theories, methods, and tools to identify and combat disinformation, hate speech, and extremism online. This institute is aimed at graduate students, faculty, and personnel from industry, education and government who want to learn more about social-cybersecurity, an emerging field of […]
Fight the Infodemic: Digital Skills to Tackle Misinformation | Montclair Public Library
Over the last few years, misinformation has dominated our digital landscape. From email to social media to “news sites,” adults are inundated with images and information that have been manipulated, taken out of context or completely fabricated! Don’t feel frustrated! Fight back! While you may not have been born a digital native, you certainly can […]
Lunch & Learn: Guide to MisInformation | Bergen Volunteers
Join Bergen LEADER, Maria Deptula for a seminar on misinformation, disinformation, bias and “fake news”. Maria Deptula will help attendees uncover how we can categorize information based on its provenance, recognize our selective preferences, and learn new sources we can refer to when in doubt.
Disinformation: The Challenges to Democracy | American Bar Association
As long as politics and elections have existed, there have always been false claims and exaggerations by leaders, candidates, their backers and even commentators. But the explosion of Internet access and social media usage in recent years has turned aberrational misinformation into a global epidemic of disinformation. On the one hand, millions more people have […]
Troubling Matters: Disinformation and the challenges of more ‘critical thinking’ | Fulbright Poland
The webinar offers a nuanced look into disinformation campaigns and presents a researcher’s perspective on these phenomena. Join us for a presentation followed by a Q&A session, in which Dr. Ahmer Arif will talk about human-centered responses to disinformation that go beyond mere fact checking. In this webinar, we will discuss how our social computing […]
Mis/Disinformation on Platforms: Can Federal Policy Reduce the Harm? | NetGain Partnership
This discussion will explore the scope of US federal policy solutions available to mitigate the spread of mis/disinformation online. This will include a discussion of the viability of Section 230 reform and other proposed regulations and how the Biden Administration is approaching platform policy. This briefing will not only cover the scope of these issues, […]
Making fact-checking a global practice: towards a common approach to countering disinformation and misinformation | Delegation of the European Union to the United Nations
Disinformation and misinformation have been broadly recognized among major modern threats. They affect societies and the functioning of democracies all over the world and, with the profusion of communication channels and advances in digital technology, they spread rapidly and threaten public goods, risk increased polarization in societies and limit the fundamental freedom to hold opinions […]
Annual IDeaS Conference: Disinformation, Hate Speech, and Extremism Online | Center for Informed Democracy & Social – cybersecurity
Natural disasters, elections, climate changes, insurrections, pandemics, and new technologies are rocking the world. People talk about events, both these massive ones and much smaller ones, on line. Social media platforms, search engines and websites have become the window through which these events are viewed and interpreted. Those on social media seek and shape information, […]
Truth Decay: Discrimination & Disinformation | Columbia Regional Educator Network
The expansion of access to information through the internet, and the rise of almost unlimited sources of news and opinion has given rise to an unprecedented spread of disinformation and misrepresentation about marginalized and oppressed populations that negatively impacts young and old alike.
Data & Democracy Symposium: Media & Misinformation | Data4Democracy
How is social media changing democracy? How are computer algorithms employed to tailor messaging for narrow groups of voters? What are the effects of disinformation campaigns? This session examines ways in which media is manipulated to control public conversation, derail democracy, and disrupt society.
Confronting Health Misinformation: A Discussion with the Surgeon General on Building a Healthy Information Environment | Stanford Internet Observatory
Join the Stanford Internet Observatory for a conversation with US Surgeon General Vivek H. Murthy, MD, MBA, where he will discuss slowing the spread of health misinformation, both during the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond. Health misinformation is a major threat to public health because it can cause confusion, sow mistrust, harm people’s health, and undermine public health efforts. Although […]
Real Talk: Pop the Disinformation Bubble | Building Bridges for America
Do you feel like you and those around you are swimming in a soup of disinformation and lies? Why is this happening? How can anyone believe this stuff? What can you do to help pop the bubble and bring people back to reality? Join us as we break down: – How to identify disinformation – […]
The Future of Platform Accountability: Research, Ethics, and Racial Justice | NetGain Partnership
A discussion on how platform research to address mis/disinformation should be approached through a race-based lens, new platform research solutions and methods being pioneered and utilized by researchers of color, the unique challenges researches of color face, and how philanthropy can better support and empower Black and Brown tech platform researchers to carry out their […]
China’s Long-Term Investments in AI Growth: Bringing the Public and Private Sectors Together | Georgetown’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology
The Chinese leadership has put artificial intelligence front and center in China’s industrial development. As part of this strategy, they have established: 1. Industry alliances—collaboration platforms involving local governments, academic institutions, and companies; and 2. Government guidance funds—public-private investment vehicles that mobilize massive amounts of capital in support of strategic and emerging technologies. CSET’s Ngor […]
Conspiracy Theories with Jen Roberts | Oregon Humanities
The Flat Earth Society. The Illuminati. QAnon. Sometimes it seems like conspiracy theories have been multiplying exponentially, especially in this time of global pandemic. Why do we gravitate toward conspiracy theories to make sense of the world? What human need do these stories fill? In this program, we’ll explore some conspiracy theories old and new, […]
Nothing is Free: The Cost to Civil Society of Online Inequity, Disinformation, Hate, and Surveillance | Charlemont Forum
Jessica J. González is Co-CEO of Free Press, an organization dedicated to “saving net neutrality, achieving affordable internet access for all, uplifting the voices of people of color in the media, challenging old and new media gatekeepers to serve the public interest, ending unwarranted surveillance, defending press freedom and reimagining local journalism.” González has worked […]
Transatlantic data flows: What’s next after the EU-U.S. Privacy Shield? | The Brookings Institution
As digitization increasingly shapes the scope of U.S. international trade, regulations and policies regarding cross-border data transfers carry significant economic implications. Yet—as the recent invalidation of the EU-U.S. Privacy Shield by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) demonstrates—trade, economic competitiveness, and free flows of data can come into tension with privacy and […]
International Counterathon Workshop | AI4Dignity
Team AI4Dignity is organizing a two-day collaborative coding event with fact checkers, AI developers and academic researchers to improve machine learning models to flag and label online extreme speech with Public plenary and panels How can AI assisted systems contribute to online extreme speech moderation? How do we envision collaborative endeavors in AI assisted moderation […]
Call for Papers Workshop: Strengthening Democracy Challenge | Stanford University
Do you have an idea about how to improve commitment to democratic principles that you would like us to test? Join the challenge! American democracy is under threat. Many Americans are willing to compromise on democratic principles for partisan goals. Some are even willing to resort to violence to help their side win. Extreme dislike […]
Knight Smart Cities Lab 2021 | Knight Foundation
As communities continue to rebuild and recover from the COVID-19 pandemic, how can they harness the lessons they’ve learned in the past year to build resiliency and prepare for future challenges? At the 2021 Knight Smart Cities Lab, we’ll help community leaders and technologists explore how to leverage federal funding, data and digital technology to […]
Webinar: How the Indigenous Investigative Collective use public records to show dire gaps in COVID-19 data access | MuckRock
In May of 2020, the Navajo Nation reported one of the highest per-capita COVID-19 infection rates in the United States. But even the dire official numbers didn’t tell the full story. The Native American Journalists Association’s Indigenous Investigative Collective brought together three newsrooms to launch a public records campaign to dig into how a mix […]
Saving the news | The Brookings Institution
The news industry in the United States is grappling with many serious and simultaneous challenges, including massive declines in the number of staff and outlets, perceptions of bias and blame for increasing political polarization, and displacement by opinion and even disinformation. Growing numbers of communities lack any local news, and online platforms draw ad revenues […]
Beyond Misinformation: Towards a Research Agenda for Information Ecosystems, Network Dynamics and Emergent Epistemologies | C4 lab
This workshop starts from the premise that the problem of online misinformation is a symptom, not a cause. While undeniably problematic, misinformation is the current cause célèbre of a larger class of pathological dynamics that have emerged in our evolving digital media ecosystems and cause harm at different systemic levels. These dynamics are exacerbated by […]
Politics and Computational Social Science (PaCSS) | Northeastern University
The fourth annual Politics and Computational Social Science (PaCSS) conference will take place virtually August 9 – 13 between 11 am – 3 pm EDT. Register now at http://pacss.eventbrite.com. The registration fee of $20 will help us cover conference expenses. We are dedicated to keeping this conference open and accessible and we ask that you […]
Wikimania | Wikimedia
Wikimania is the Wikimedia movement’s annual conference celebrating the free knowledge projects made possible by the volunteer community and hosted by the Wikimedia Foundation – Commons, MediaWiki, Meta-Wiki, Wikibooks, Wikidata, Wikinews, Wikipedia, Wikiquote, Wikisource, Wikispecies, Wikiversity, Wikivoyage, Wiktionary – with three days of conferences, discussions, meetups, training, and workshops. Hundreds of volunteers and Free Knowledge leaders from around the world gather to discuss issues, report on new projects and […]
Global Disinfo Summit
The events of 2020 have demonstrated the power of disinformation and its effect on the public’s perceptions. New technologies, such as the broad adoption and availability of Artificial Intelligence, will continue to blur the lines between what is real and what is fake. Instant access to global platforms has resulted in a proliferation of conspiracy […]
Misinformation: Stopping the spread | Alliance for Science
Humans are now able to access information through more channels than ever before, exposing us to potentially dangerous conspiracy theories and deliberate disinformation campaigns. How and why does misinformation start? And what can we do to slow or stop its viral online spread? Join our panel of experts as they discuss ways to encourage […]
Annenberg Conversations on Gender: From Algorithm Audits to Accountability | Annenberg School for Communication
In this conversation, Duncan Watts and Danaë Metaxa will discuss Metaxa’s research using algorithm audits to measure gender and racial bias in online services such as Google Images. In addition to exploring the relevance of Metaxa’s work to algorithmic systems, the discussion will also touch on the importance of reconciling the sometimes competing epistemic values […]
The Future of Platform Accountability: Research, Ethics, and Racial Justice | NetGain Partnership
A discussion on how platform research to address mis/disinformation should be approached through a race-based lens, new platform research solutions and methods being pioneered and utilized by researchers of color, the unique challenges researchers of color face, and how philanthropy can better support and empower Black and Brown tech platform researchers to carry out their […]
CARGC Book Talk: Visions of Beirut: The Urban Life of Media Infrastructure | Annenberg School for Communication
In Visions of Beirut, Hatim El-Hibri explores how the creation and circulation of images has shaped the urban spaces and cultural imaginaries of Beirut. Drawing on fieldwork and texts ranging from maps, urban plans, and aerial photographs to live television and drone-camera footage, El-Hibri traces the histories of how the technologies and media infrastructure that […]
A new Bretton Woods for Data | Oxford Internet Institute
Oxford Internet Institute presents ‘A new Bretton Woods for Data’. A conversation with Elizabeth Denham CBE, UK Information Commissioner and Global Privacy Assembly chair. Here is the paradox: as data protection laws increasingly align towards a high standard, data protectionism is on the rise too. Ever more countries are establishing stricter rules on the cross-border […]
Crossing Borders, Counter-cartographies: Contemplations and Collaborations Using Historic Newspapers | Library of Congress
In this talk, Dr. Celeste González de Bustamante, University of Arizona journalism professor, will discuss how research involving historical newspapers, including those in the National Digital Newspaper Program, contributes to better understanding of the Mexico-United States borderlands and beyond. Her talk will consider how interdisciplinary and cross border collaborations with libraries, librarians, and media scholars […]
2021 Princeton University Constitution Day Lecture | Program in American Studies
Ruha Benjamin is professor of African American studies at Princeton University, founding director of the Ida B. Wells Just Data Lab, and author of the award-winning book Race After Technology: Abolitionist Tools for the New Jim Code among many other publications. Her work investigates the social dimensions of science, medicine and technology with a focus […]
Becoming a digital power: Japan’s path for domestic transformation and international influence | Brookings Institute
With the growing risk of the fragmentation of the international digital ecosystem, prioritizing digital transformation has never been more important for Japan. The country’s digital transformation will largely determine its ability to adjust to profound demographic changes brought on by an ageing and contracting population, find new sources of competitiveness and drivers for productivity at […]
Responding to AI Enabled Surveillance and Digital Authoritarianism | Berkman Klein Center
This event is part of a three-part symposium on Security, Privacy, and Innovation: Reshaping Law for the AI Era. The first, Responding to AI Enabled Surveillance and Digital Authoritarianism is on September 17, 2021, the second, Constitutional Values and the Rule of Law in the AI Era: Confronting a Changing Threat Landscape is on September […]
Towards a Post-Pandemic World: Lessons from COVID-19 for Now and the Future | NASEM
Event Listing Header Join the Forum on Microbial Threats for an exciting virtual conversation about what we’ve learned from 15 months of living through a global pandemic. The workshop will broadly examine responses to COVID-19 in the U.S. and abroad, and will host retrospective and prospective discussions on the broad impacts of the pandemic on […]
The Pen Vs. The AK-47: The Future of Afghan Media Under the Taliban | Shorenstein Center
Media in Afghanistan flourished over the past twenty years, with independent, politically-affiliated, and internationally-supported media networks providing local, national, and international news as well as entertainment. Since the Taliban re-took control of the country in August, 2021, thousands of journalists have fled the country, and many news and media organizations have shut their doors. Spring […]
Center for Media at Risk Roundtable: Archiving Trump: Cruelties, Corruption and Citational Complexity | Annenberg School for Communication
Defender of democracy, activist for women’s rights, and advocate for the LGBTQ+ community, Amy Siskind is best known as the author of The Weekly List and as President of The New Agenda, a non-profit dedicated to the advancement of women. On Twitter she is @Amy_Siskind. Jay Rosen has been teaching journalism at New York University […]
Constitutional Values and the Rule of Law in the AI Era: Confronting a Changing Threat Landscape | Berkman Klein Center
This event is part of a three-part symposium on Security, Privacy, and Innovation: Reshaping Law for the AI Era. The first, Responding to AI Enabled Surveillance and Digital Authoritarianism is on September 17, 2021, the second, Constitutional Values and the Rule of Law in the AI Era: Confronting a Changing Threat Landscape is on September 24, 2021, and the […]
Lies and Democracy | Knight First Amendment Institute
“No one has ever doubted that truth and politics are on rather bad terms with each other, and no one, as far as I know, has ever counted truthfulness among the political virtues,” wrote Hannah Arendt in 1967. Today, concerns run especially high over the fraught relationship between truth and politics, as majorities of Republican […]
Anti-Asian Sentiment Before Covid-19 | Digital Democracies Institute
Event Listing Header As many media accounts have recounted, Stop AAPI Hate reported that anti-Asian violence soared during the first wave of the 2020 COVID19 pandemic. From mid-March 2020 to the end of February 2021, 3,795 “Anti-Asian hate incidents” were reported to Stop AAPI Hate. North of the U.S. border in the Canadian province of […]
Protecting and Promoting AI Innovation: Patent Eligibility Reform as an Imperative for National Security and Innovation | Berkman Klein Center
This event is part of a three-part symposium on Security, Privacy, and Innovation: Reshaping Law for the AI Era. The first, Responding to AI Enabled Surveillance and Digital Authoritarianism is on September 17, 2021, the second, Constitutional Values and the Rule of Law in the AI Era: Confronting a Changing Threat Landscape is on September 24, 2021, and the […]
Reporting the Capitol Riots: A Conversation with Kadia Goba and Malachy Browne | Annenberg School for Communication
This session will provide an opportunity to discuss the challenges of reporting on Capitol Riots. Kadia Goba was on the ground reporting from inside the Capitol and Malachy Browne used eyewitness footage to piece together events from the thousands of livestreams and posts to social media. We will hear them talk about their experiences from […]
Conference for Truth and Trust Online | Truth and Trust Online
While trustworthy online spaces benefit everyone, untrustworthy content and behaviour can divide, confuse, and cause real harm. The annual Conference for Truth and Trust Online is organised as a unique collaboration between practitioners, technologists, academics and platforms, to share, discuss, and collaborate on useful technical innovations and research in the space. Our mission is to […]
Tech Whistleblowing: Resources, Ramifications, & Resiliency | NetGain Partnership
Tech sector whistleblowers have played an increasingly vital role in exposing racism and toxic workplace environments, algorithmic bias, and other platform harms. But the cost of coming forward with information can be tremendous – including psychological, legal, and employment ramifications. This webinar will explore what is needed to build and maintain safe and secure channels […]
Global Disinformation Index – Public Launch of Report & Results for Canada | Digital Democracies Institute
Event featured image, but exclude link Event content Register here for the launch event for this highly anticipated event. News websites have financial incentives to spread disinformation, in order to increase their online traffic and, ultimately, their advertising revenue. Meanwhile, the dissemination of disinformation has disruptive and impactful consequences. The COVID-19 pandemic offers a recent […]
Dr. Casey Fiesler (Colorado Boulder) on Three Lessons Towards Ethical Tech | Barnard Vagelos Computational Science Center
Hardly a day passes without a new technology ethics scandal–from privacy violations on social media platform to biased algorithms to controversial data collection for training facial recognition systems. In computing practice and research, good intentions sometimes still lead to negative consequences. This talk describes three lessons from my research that inform ethical practices in studying, […]
Lies and Elections | Knight First Amendment Institute
How should the government regulate election-related speech? Trump’s “Big Lie” raises the question of whether lies about election results should be regulated by the social media platforms, as well as the government. But of course, these kinds of lies are not the only kinds of election-related lies that raise thorny free speech questions. Can or […]
Credible threat: Attacks against women online and the future of democracy | Centre for Research in Communication and Culture
Activists. Journalists. Elected Representatives. Public Intellectuals. When women are vocal about political and social issues, too-often they are flogged with attacks via social networking sites, comment sections, discussion boards, email, and direct message. Rather than targeting their ideas, the abuse targets their identities, pummeling them with rape threats, attacks on their appearance and presumed sexual […]
AI in Healthcare: Mitigating Disparities, Biases & Misinformation | Hariri Institute
Event Listing Header Artificial Intelligence (AI) and social media are finding useful applications in health care, yet, their use may perpetuate or even accentuate inequities, disparities, and the critical role of social determinants of health, or even facilitate the spread of health-related misinformation. The symposium will convene AI experts, medical researchers and practitioners, and computer […]
Mainstream Media is the Problem | Network Science Institute
There is a lot of concern about how the news ecosystem affects public opinion, political polarization, and democracy. Most of the research and public debate focuses on overtly fake material, particularly as it is distributed through social media. But, the vast majority of news consumption is actual produced by mainstream media, and the most common […]
CDCS Colloquium: Social Media and the Shape of “Man” | Annenberg School for Communication
Inspired by ethnographic work with queer of color users of the platform Tumblr during its heyday from 2010-2015 and using the Tumblr presence of Filipinx transfeminine visual and performance artist Mark Aguhar as a recurring touchstone, this talk’s provocation is that the assumptive ways in which a social media platform “should” be designed — singular […]
Conspiracy Theories and Political Culture, Past and Present: A Conversation with The Atlantic’s Adrienne LaFrance and James McAuley | Annenberg School for Communication
Join Adrienne LaFrance, executive editor of The Atlantic and James McAuley, The Atlantic contributor and author of The House of Fragile Things, a history of Dreyfus-era France, for a conversation around the long history of conspiracy theory and its role in political culture, then and now. The discussion will be moderated by Sophia Rosenfeld, Walter H. Annenberg Professor of History at Penn. The […]
How Status Seeking and Social Learning Shape Political Polarization on Social Media | Annenberg School for Communication
Popular narratives about how social media shapes political polarization emphasize echo chambers, foreign misinformation campaigns, and algorithmic radicalization. Yet a careful review of the scientific literature indicates there is surprisingly little evidence that these factors shape political beliefs or inter-group attitudes. Drawing upon multiple field experiments, large-scale analysis of social media data, and longitudinal in-depth […]
CDCS Colloquium: Beyond fairness: Datafication and Social Justice | Annenberg School for Communication
Lina Dencik is Professor in Digital Communication and Society at Cardiff’s School of Journalism, Media and Culture and Co-Founder/Director of the Data Justice Lab. Her research concerns the interplay between media developments and social and political change, with a particular focus on resistance, governance, and the politics of data. She has published five books including […]
The Facebook Files: Are teens and democratic societies at risk? | Shorenstein Center
Over the past two months, the Wall Street Journal’s “Facebook Files” series has chronicled the ways that Facebook and its platforms favor elites, harm teenagers’ mental health, encourage toxicity, take weak action to stop human trafficking and drug cartels, suppress political movements, and ignore the concerns of their employees that Facebook can clean up its […]
Lessons From the First Internet Ages | Knight Foundation
What is the future of the internet? Thirty years after the creation of the first web page, what have we learned about the impact of the internet on communication, connection, and democracy? Join the Knight Foundation for Lessons from the First Internet Ages, a virtual symposium that will explore and evaluate what key figures in […]
Accounting for AI — a Comparison of Methods | Berkman Klein Center
A few years ago, Finale Doshi-Velez and Mason Kortz – and a squad of collaborators – unpacked explanation as one way to hold AI systems accountable. Many frameworks for AI regulation and best practices have since emerged. In this conversation, Finale and Mason return to the question of accountability and regulation for AI: What are […]
Lessons from the First Internet Ages Symposium | Knight Foundation
What is the future of the Internet? Thirty years after the creation of the first web page, what have we learned about the impact of the Internet on communication, connection, and democracy? Join the Knight Foundation for Lessons from the First Internet Ages, a virtual symposium that will explore and evaluate what key figures in the development […]
The Role of Legal Strategy in Platform Research | NetGain Partnership
When platform researchers undertake new projects, it is crucial to assess legal risks. Yet the legal constraints on platform research are often ambiguous. This webinar will explore what legal resources platform researchers need, as well as how to make decisions to reach research objectives.
Applied Algorithmic Ethics | Marquette University
As algorithms increasingly automate decision-making processes, filter information flows, and mediate our social interactions, ethical concerns immediately follow. Questions of fairness, accountability, and transparency permeate the growing set of concerns around the social and ethical implications of algorithms. As a growing community of scholars grapples with the ethics of algorithms, how can their findings be […]
Global News & Technology Leadership in Challenging Times | Shorenstein Center
The challenges facing global news-industry leaders have seldom been as great as today. Economic disruption, technology transformation and a frontal assault on an independent free press as ‘enemies of the people’ are creating unprecedented headwinds for news leaders. How do they lead in such tumultuous times? And where do they see opportunities for success beyond […]
Addressing Health Misinformation Through Community | Knight Foundation
Across the country, libraries, educators and civil society generally are leading in playing vital roles in addressing health misinformation in communities. We look forward to hearing insights from experts in the field on how we can best mitigate the impacts of misinformation and empower individuals to seek factual information. Join Knight Foundation and the Digital […]
Can Society Control Big Tech? Truth and Trust | Shorenstein Center
This conversation is off the record. Please use this registration form if you wish to join us online. Please note that our speaker will be presenting in person at Harvard Kennedy School in Rubenstein 414AB (ELLWOOD DEMOCRACY LAB). Anyone with a Harvard ID is invited to join us on a first-come, first-served basis.
“Beyond “Technological Exception”: Emerging Debates in Cuban Independent Journalism” | Annenberg School for Communication
About the Speaker Sara García Santamaría is an Associate Professor at Universitat Jaume I and Universitat Blanquerna – Ramon Llull in Spain. She holds a Doctorate in Journalism Studies from the University of Sheffield (UK), where her research explored how the Cuban state-run media constructs the role of the people in public debate. Having completed […]
Diversity and Inequality in Social Networks | Network Science Institute
Online social networks often mirror inequality in real-world networks, from historical prejudice, economic or social factors. Such disparities are often picked up and amplified by algorithms that leverage social data for the purpose of providing recommendations, diffusing information, or forming groups. In this talk, we’ll discuss possible explanations for algorithmic bias in social networks, specifically […]
The 2021 Salant Lecture on Freedom of the Press: Maria Ressa | Shorenstein Center
On Tuesday, November 16th at 6:00 pm ET in the John F. Kennedy Jr. Forum, this year’s Salant Lecture on Freedom of the Press will be delivered by Maria Ressa, 2021 Nobel Peace Prize winner, co-founder and CEO of Rappler.com, Fall 2021 Shorenstein Center Fellow, and Center for Public Leadership Hauser Leader. Shorenstein Center on Media, […]
Rethinking the Limits: Provocative and Extreme Speech | Annenberg School for Communication
Democracies are struggling to balance freedom of expression with equality for the weak as well as accountability for harmful speech. There is growing alarm at how internet giants distort the marketplace of ideas, undermine human dignity and derail truth-seeking — but little consensus on what should be done. Can we still have faith in the […]
Elihu Katz Colloquium: Is an “ethical” internet possible? | Annenberg School for Communication
How can we ethically engage a military-derived technology that has infiltrated every aspect of our lives from refrigerators to furniture? The weaponizing potential of the internet was part and partial to its initial conceit yet this history is often forgotten and therefore remains unconnected to the current violence that this life changing technology has enabled […]
MIC Panel Event: Imagining a New Social Contract for Media | Annenberg School for Communication
Expanding positive freedoms that enable greater opportunities for communication—as opposed to emphasizing only negative freedoms that protect us from harm—is foundational to reforming our media system so that it serves everyone. Even as concerns about social harms currently dominate contemporary policy discussions, it is important to articulate collective needs and the political imaginary necessary for […]
Factual Corrections and Misinformation During the 2020 U.S. Election: Evidence from Panel Experiments | Network Science Institute
We measure the immediate and medium-term effects of 21 highly-trafficked pieces of misinformation and fact-checks during the 2020 U.S. election with eight panel experiments (N = 17,681). Exposure to misinformation increased false beliefs by an average of 4.3 points on a 100-point belief certainty scale. Exposure to fact-checks more than corrected this effect, decreasing false […]
Gender, Political Persuasion, and Social Media: A Field Experiment During the 2020 Democratic Primary | Network Science Institute
Research indicates women have less influence than men in a variety of professional settings, including politics. We conducted a field experiment on a social media platform where Democrats were randomly assigned female or male avatar before discussing their preferred candidate for the 2020 presidential primary election. By measuring changes in people’s preferences before and after […]
The Interplay of Technology, Ethics, and Policy | Network Science Institute
This talk will be hybrid in-person and via Zoom. Register in advance here for this meeting using your institutional email address. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting. Technology is often designed and deployed without critical reflection of the values that it embodies. Value trade-offs—between security and privacy, […]
Center for Media at Risk Symposium: Image-Based Abuse | Annenberg
Image-based abuse is a public health crisis that silences marginalized groups and degrades public discourse. Ranging across the COVID-19 pandemic, political campaigns and social network reform, image-based abuse finds its way into nearly every pressing public issue today. This symposium will identify patterning in its occurrence, strategize research agendas for its clarification and develop policy […]
How to address extremism among veterans | The Brookings Institution
The mob assault on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021 opened a new chapter in domestic terrorism. For the first time in our nation’s history, America experienced its first non-peaceful post-election transfer of power. To date, more than 660 arrests have been made, and more than 12% of those arrested were veterans of the […]
The True Costs of Misinformation | Network Science Institute
It all feels like a precursor to a bad joke: What do foreign agents, white supremacists, conspiracists, snake oil salesmen, political operatives, white academics, and a disgruntled bunch of zoomers have in common? The groups have collided in a centrifuge of chaos online, where the tactics they use to hide their identities and manipulate audiences […]
The Post-Soviet Press: A Long Road to Freedom | Shorenstein Center
Thirty years ago this December, the Soviet Union broke up, creating 15 new countries and high expectations that many of them would embrace democracy — including guarantees of freedom of the press. Thirty years on, only a handful of the post-Soviet states have met expectations for free, independent media. Several others maintain strict, Soviet-style controls […]
Technology, inequality, and democracy | The Brookings Institution
Advances in digital technologies and artificial intelligence hold great promise to boost economic prosperity. But as these technologies transform nearly every aspect of business and work, they are reshaping growth and distributional dynamics in ways that can increase economic inequality. Indeed, inequality has been rising in many countries, notably in the United States. Rising inequality […]
Abundance: On the Experience of Living in a World of Information Plenty | Annenberg School for Communication
Information overload is something that humans have dealt with for millennia. During different historical eras, massive increases in what was available to know has motivated the creation of systems for sorting, indexing, and compiling information as well as concerns that the abundance of information might cause cultural anxiety or even drive people to madness. The […]
From COVID-19 to culture wars: The growing hostility of education politics | The Brookings Institution
For education policymakers, the last two years have been among the most tumultuous and challenging in U.S. history. Issue after issue has stirred controversy, including COVID-induced school closures, mask and vaccine mandates, critical race theory, and transgender students’ rights. Local school board meetings have been stages for many conflicts. Board members are confronting angry protestors […]
Platform Governance: Trust and Transparency | Yale Law School Information Society Project
Civil society and government stakeholders have very low trust in industry, based on repeated violations of the latter’s own promises. Concurrently, information asymmetry is an initial hurdle to both studying and proposing solutions for platform governance. However, as with everything in this space, the answer is rarely as simple as it may seem at first […]
Security by Spectacle: The Invention of Gray Hat Hacking & The Fight Against Microsoft in the 1990s | Berkman Klein Center
This talk will draw on research from “Wearing Many Hats,” a forthcoming Data & Society report authored by Matt Goerzen and Gabriella Coleman. Dr. Coleman describes her talk as follows: Our report examines the transformative period in which many hackers moved from a vilified underground subculture into a domain of respected professionalism, playing a privileged […]
A Lie Can Travel: Election Disinformation in the United States, Brazil, and France | Center for Democracy & Technology
A newly released report from the Center for Democracy & Technology (CDT) – A Lie Can Travel: Election Disinformation in the United States, Brazil, and France – published by Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung (KAS), explores recent case studies of election disinformation in the U.S., Brazil, and France. It also examines tactics for mitigating the problem, including interventions by […]
Reducing Harm on Social Media: Research & Design Ideas | NYU’s Center for Social Media and Politics
When social media platforms first launched nearly two decades ago, they were seen as a force for good – a way to connect with family and friends, learn and explore new ideas, and engage with social and political movements. Yet, as the Facebook Papers and other research have documented, these same platforms have become vectors […]
The Capitol Coup One Year Later: How Research can Assess and Counter Threats to Democracy | GWU Institute for Data, Democracy, and Politics
George Washington Univeristy Washington D.C, District of ColumbiaThe George Washington University’s Institute for Data, Democracy & Politics (IDDP) and The University of North Carolina’s Center for Information, Technology, and Public Life (CITAP) invite you to join them for The Capitol Coup One Year Later: How Research Can Assess and Counter Threats to Democracy, a two day conference exploring key questions surrounding January […]
The January 6 insurrection: One year later | The Brookings Institution
Nearly one year ago, a violent mob broke into the United States Capitol in an effort to halt the certification of the electoral vote and overturn the 2020 election in favor of Donald Trump. The insurrection was, thankfully, unsuccessful. But its echoes continue to reverberate today: Many in the Republican Party attempt to deny, minimize, […]
Book Talk: Discriminating Data: Wendy Hui Kyong Chun in Conversation with Sarah Banet-Weiser | Annenberg
In Discriminating Data: Correlation, Neighborhoods, and the New Politics of Recognition, Wendy Hui Kyong Chun reveals how polarization is a goal—not an error—within big data and machine learning. These methods, she argues, encode segregation, eugenics, and identity politics through their default assumptions and conditions. Correlation, which grounds big data’s predictive potential, stems from twentieth-century eugenic […]
Combating Health-Related Misinformation and Disinformation | University of Minnesota School of Public Health
The COVID-19 pandemic has shown that health-related misinformation and disinformation can dangerously undermine the response to a public health crisis. Misleading information, intentional or not, has a myriad of effects, including reduced trust in public health responders, increased belief in false medical cures, and politicization of public health measures. The spread of these falsehoods has […]