disinformation

The 19th* Co-Founder & Publisher Amanda Zamora discusses the real-life harms of polarization, the struggles of local news, and what outlets can do to help bridge communal divides.

JANUARY 13, 2022 – America is in a crisis of trust and truth. Members of the Aspen Institute’s Commission on Information Disorder participate in a live, virtual conversation on ways to address the country’s mis- and disinformation challenges.

NOVEMBER 15, 2021 – Following months of expert consultation and internal discussion, the Aspen Institute’s Commission on Information Disorder has launched its recommendations for addressing America’s urgent mis- and disinformation crisis. Co-chairs Katie Couric, Chris Krebs, and Rashad Robinson engage in a lively discussion of how government, private industry, and civil society can increase transparency and understanding, build trust, and reduce harms.

America is in a crisis of trust and truth. Bad information has become as prevalent, persuasive, and persistent as good information, creating a chain reaction of harm. It makes any health crisis more deadly. It slows down response time on climate change. It undermines democracy. In their final report, the Aspen Institute’s Commission on Information Disorder makes 15 recommendations for how government, private industry, and civil society can reduce the greatest harms of mis- and disinformation.

How is the rampant spread of mis/disinformation contributing to that breakdown of trust? What is the role of online platforms in combating it? What about individual users?

Two experts in the field of cognitive science, Dr. Danielle Polage of Central Washington University and researcher Dr. Babak Hemmatian, bring an understanding to how the brain responds to false information online. Dr. Polage studies the impacts of false information in digital environments, and the effects that exposure to repeated lying can have on an individual’s belief patterns. Dr. Babak Hemmatian researches how social narratives form and are negotiated using computational methods and behavioral experiments.

John Poulos – the President and CEO of a leading industry supplier of US election technology, Dominion Voting – joins Commission Co-chair Chris Krebs, founding director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, to discuss the effects on his company of the Big Lie that the 2020 US presidential election was stolen, and the active role business executives must play in preventing disinformation from spreading across their own companies to maintain trust in their brands.

Jay Rosen, a long-time professor of journalism at New York University and one of the great thinkers on the changing nature of journalism in the digital age, speaks with Aspen Digital’s Executive Director, Vivian Schiller, on the challenges and opportunities around disinformation within the news industry.

Alan Miller, CEO and founder of the News Literacy Project, examines the role of news literacy and education as an effective countermeasure to the spread of mis- and disinformation with Aspen Digital Executive Director Vivian Schiller.

Amy Webb, founder and CEO of the Future Today Institute, speaks with Aspen Digital Executive Director Vivian Schiller on future disinformation threats, what to anticipate, and effective measures society can take today.