Strategic disinformation is an accelerant for major societal problems such as climate change, extremism, polarisation, fraud, and suppression of rights. It is exploited across all information dissemination platforms, including social media, news media, financial and non-financial reporting, and other broadcast vehicles.
Purpose
Convene global thought leaders from psychology, journalism, financial reporting, political science, and related information science fields to discuss:
- the societal impact of strategic disinformation
- methods used to disseminate disinformation
- the psychology of entrenched belief systems, and
- means to mitigate disinformation efficacy.
Registration
Due to limited availability, attendance for the July in-person and live feed online events requires registration.
Register to attend the Cambridge Disinformation Summit via live online feed
The cost to join this event via a live online feed is £125. Registration to attend online closes on 27 July 2023.
To apply for a need-based registration fee waiver, please email [email protected].
Register to attend the Cambridge Disinformation Summit in-person
The cost to join this event in-person ranges between £365-£650. Registration to attend in-person closes on 30 June 2023.
To apply for a need-based registration fee reduction, please email [email protected].
Location
The Cambridge Disinformation Summit will be held at King’s College, Cambridge.
A dinner will also be hosted at King’s College, Cambridge.
Thursday 27 July 2023
Time |
Event |
---|---|
08:30-08:45 |
Conference welcomeThis session will discuss the objectives of the Summit, including a vision for future interdisciplinary research, curriculum, and policy project collaboration.
King’s College Hall |
08:45-09:15 |
Disinformation: definition, history, strategy, consequencesThis session will define key terms and offer important historical perspective regarding disinformation strategy and consequences.
King’s College Hall |
09:15-10:15 |
Belief systems: why is disinformation effective?This session will offer key psychological insights for why and how disinformation can polarise societal groups and entrench people in belief systems.
King’s College Hall |
10:15-10:45 |
Break |
10:45-12:00 |
Societal implications of disinformationThis session will offer current perspectives regarding the effects of disinformation on climate, health, business, and democracy.
King’s College Hall |
12:00-13:00 |
Lunch |
13:00-14:00 |
Platform accountability vs free speech rightsThis session will offer legal, policy, and societal impact perspectives regarding the balance between information dissemination platform accountability and free speech rights.
King’s College Hall |
14:00-14:30 |
Break |
14:30-15:30 |
Discerning information credibility: fact-checking, natural language processing, and auditThis session will discuss the benefits and limitations of current technology to identify and disclose evidence of false or inaccurate information that may affect society.
King’s College Hall |
15:30-16:00 |
Break |
16:00-17:00 |
Potential benefits and risks from Generative AIThis session will discuss the potential benefits and risks of Generative Alternative Intelligence.
King’s College Hall |
19:00-22:00 |
Private showing: The YouTube Effect documentary, with introduction from Alex WinterThis session will discuss the rise of YouTube and its positive and damaging effects on society. Alex Winter, movie actor, director, and producer, will introduce the documentary and answer questions after the viewing. The Cambridge Union |
Friday 28 July 2023
Time |
Event |
---|---|
08:30-09:30 |
Profiteering: the business of disinformationThis session will discuss the financial and power incentives from disinformation and which actors engage disinformation for profit.
King’s College Hall |
09:30-10:30 |
Journalistic integrityThis session will discuss the current state of journalistic integrity, including the effects of economic incentives on news media platforms, and offer recommendations to improve integrity.
King’s College Hall |
10:30-11:00 |
Break |
11:00-12:00 |
Micro targetingThis session will discuss how to identify micro communities who hold shared beliefs and the societal implications of customising disinformation for these micro communities.
King’s College Hall |
12:00-13:00 |
Lunch |
13:00-14:00 |
Open-source intelligenceThis session will discuss open-source intelligence techniques and current and potential future applications for this technology.
King’s College Hall |
14:00-14:30 |
Break |
14:30-16:00 |
Combatting disinformation: counterprogramming, inoculation, education, and communityThis session will discuss the efficacy and promise of methods currently employed to minimise the societal effects of disinformation.
King’s College Hall |
18:00-18:45 |
Drinks |
18:45-19:30 |
Keynote: Social media responsibility and accountabilityThis session will discuss perspectives on social media platforms’ responsibility to society.
Discussion facilitated by Brian Klaas, Associate Professor in Global Politics, University College London King’s College Hall |
19:30-19:45 |
Closing comments
King’s College Hall |
19:45-21:45 |
DinnerKing’s College Hall |

Dinner keynote
Frances Haugen
Advocate for Accountability & Transparency in Social Media and Co-Founder of Beyond the Screen
Speakers
Abdullahi Alim
Head of Project 2030 at the International Chamber of Commerce
Bram Alkema
COO of DROG Group
Brad Badertscher
Deloitte Professor of Accountancy, University of Notre Dame Mendoza College of Business
Ioana Belu
Executive Director, Business Intelligence Unit
Diane Benscoter
Founder, antidote.ngo and author of “Shoes of a Servant – My Unconditional Devotion to a Lie”
Robert Bloomfield
Nicholas H. Noyes Professor of Management, Cornell University SC Johnson College of Business
Kalina Bontcheva
Professor of Computer Science and Head of Natural Language Processing Research Group, University of Sheffield
Joshua Braun
Associate Professor of Journalism, University of Massachusetts at Amherst
Emma Briant
Research Affiliate, University of Cambridge Judge Business School Centre for Financial Reporting & Accountability
Nerissa Brown
Associate Dean of Graduate Programs and Professor of Accountancy, University of Illinois Gies College of Business
Christabel Cowling
EY UK&I Audit Partner and UK Head of Regulatory and Public Policy
Henry Friedman
Associate Professor of Accounting, UCLA Anderson School of Management
Alexandra Geese
Member, European Parliament
Beth Goldberg
Head of Research, Jigsaw at Google
Julie Inman Grant
Australia eSafety Commissioner
Todd Helmus
Senior Behavioural Scientist, RAND Corporation
M. Todd Henderson
Michael J. Marks Professor of Law, The University of Chicago Law School
Alan Jagolinzer
Professor of Financial Reporting, University of Cambridge Judge Business School
Stephen Jolly
Former senior British Defence official; Fellow Commoner, St Edmund’s College, Cambridge; Senior Adviser, Reputation Inc., Oslo
Agne Kaarlep
Head of Policy at Tremau & Former Policy Officer for Digital Services and Platforms at European Commission
Brian Klaas
Associate Professor in Global Politics, University College London
Dessi Lange-Damianova
Chief Operating Officer, Bellingcat
Heidi Larson
Professor of Anthropology, Risk and Decision Science, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine & Director, Vaccine Confidence Project
Stephan Lewandowsky
Chair in Cognitive Psychology, School of Psychological Science, University of Bristol
Craig Lewis
Madison S. Wiggington Professor of Finance, Vanderbilt University Owen Graduate School of Management and former Chief Economist at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission
Andrea Liebman
Senior Analyst, Lead Social Media, Swedish Psychological Defence Agency
Mark Manning
Technical Specialist, Sustainable Finance and Stewardship, Financial Conduct Authority
Veena McCoole
VP Communications and Marketing, NewsGuard
Joe McFadden
Deputy General Counsel at McKinsey & Company
Rafi Mendelsohn
VP Marketing, Cyabra
Lee Mwiti
Chief Editor, Africa Check
Raju Narisetti
Leader and Publisher, Global Publishing, McKinsey & Company
Taylor Owen
Beaverbrook Chair in Media, Ethics and Communications, & founding director of The Center for Media, Technology and Democracy, Max Bell, School of Public Policy, McGill University
Daniele Quercia
Head of Responsible AI, Nokia Bell Labs and Professor in Urban Informatics, King’s College London
Sunita Sah
Professor of Management Studies, Cornell University SC Johnson College of Business
Richard Sambrook
Emeritus Professor, Cardiff University School of Journalism, Media and Culture
Marie Santini
Professor, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro School of Communication
Gabriella Stern
Director of Communications, World Health Organization
David Stillwell
Professor of Computational Social Science, University of Cambridge Judge Business School
Stefan Thiel
John Thornely Fellow and Director of Studies in Law, Sidney Sussex College, University of Cambridge
Jussi Toivanen
Head of Communications, Finnish Transport and Communications Agency, National Cyber Security Centre
Sander van der Linden
Professor of Social Psychology in Society, University of Cambridge
Clare Wang
Professor of Accounting and Director of the Center for Ethics and Social Responsibility Research, University of Colorado
Michael Willis
Management Practice Associate Professor and Director of the Cambridge Executive Master of Accounting Programme
Alex Winter
Director, writer, movie actor, and founder of Trouper Productions, which produces documentaries
- Abdullahi Alim, Head of Project 2030 at the International Chamber of Commerce
- Brad Badertscher, Deloitte & Touche Professor of Accountancy, University of Notre Dame
- Robert Bloomfield, Nicholas H. Noyes Professor of Management, Cornell University SC Johnson College of Business
- Hui Chen, Professor of Accounting, University of Zurich
- Angus Crawford, Correspondent, BBC News
- Stephen Cushion, Director of Postgraduate Research, School of Journalism, Media and Culture, Cardiff University
- Mark de Rond, Professor of Organisational Ethnography, Cambridge Judge Business School
- Peter Easton, Director, Center for Accounting Research & Education, University of Notre Dame
- Michelle Ferrier, Executive Director, Media Innovation Collaboratory; Professor, FAMU School of Journalism & Graphic Communication; Founder of TrollBusters
- Duncan Green, Professor of Practice in International Development, London School of Economics; Senior Strategic Adviser, Oxfam GB
- Alan Jagolinzer, Professor of Financial Accounting, Co-Director, Cambridge Centre for Financial Reporting & Accountability
- Stephen Jolly, Professeur Agrégé de Géopolitique, ESC Rennes School of Business, Grande École; Fellow Commoner, St Edmund’s College, Cambridge; former senior British Defence official and propagandist
- Brian Klaas, Associate Professor in Global Politics, University College London
- Sander van der Linden, Professor of Social Psychology in Society and Director, Cambridge Social Decision-Making Laboratory, University of Cambridge
- Miriam Matthews, Senior Behavioral and Social Scientist, RAND Corporation
- Sarah McVay, Deloitte & Touche Endowed Professor in Accounting, University of Washington Foster School of Business
- Joseph Pierre, MD, Health Sciences Clinical Professor, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, University of California at San Francisco
- Rafael Rogo, Professor of Accounting, Co-Director, Cambridge Centre for Financial Reporting & Accountability
- Thomas Roulet, University Senior Lecturer in Organisation Theory, University of Cambridge Judge Business School
- Sunita Sah, Associate Professor of Management and Organizations, Cornell University
- Marietje Schaake, International Policy Director, Stanford University Cyber Policy Center; International Policy Fellow at Stanford’s Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence; former Member of European Parliament.
- David Stillwell, Lecturer in Big Data Analytics and Quantitative Social Science, Cambridge Judge Business School; Academic Director, The Psychometrics Centre, University of Cambridge
- Ben Taylor, Global Climate Change and Sustainability Services Strategy Partner, EY London
- Kate Wilkinson, Senior Product Manager, Full Fact
The Advisory Board membership is evolving and subject to change.
The Centre for Financial Reporting & Accountability and the Psychometrics Centre are partnering with Mendoza College of Business, the Center for Accounting Research & Education, the University of Zurich and the Journal of Financial Reporting.
Social media and financial news manipulation research
17:00, 24 April 2023
Professor Shimon Kogan and Professor Marina Niessner
Professors Shimon Kogan and Marina Niessner from the University of Pennsylvania Wharton School discuss their research regarding social media and financial news manipulation
Wilful ignorance, delusion-like beliefs, and conspiracy theories
19:00-20:30, 27 January 2022
Dr Joseph Pierre, MD
Health Sciences Clinical Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences, David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA
The use and efficacy of propaganda
12:00-13:00, 25 February 2022
Stephen Jolly
Professeur Agrégé de Géopolitique at Rennes School of Business, Fellow Commoner of St Edmund’s College, Cambridge, and former senior British Defence official
The process and impact of media fact-checking
12:00-13:00, 24 March 2022
Kate Wilkinson
Deputy chief editor at Africa Check
Business risk of disinformation
19:00-20:00, 28 April 2022
Matt Gorham
Senior Fellow, Cyber & Privacy Innovation Institute, PwC US
Disinformation for profit: the dark business behind disinformation
19:00-20:00, 23 May 2022
Dr Emma Briant
Associate Researcher in the Human Rights Program at Bard College and research affiliate of the Cambridge Centre for Financial Reporting & Accountability
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