Phil Howard INFORMATION · DISINFORMATION · DEMOCRACY

Lie Machines

How to Save Democracy from Troll Armies, Deceitful Robots, Junk News Operations, and Political Operatives.

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Phil Howard is a Professor at Oxford University and Director of the Programme on Democracy and Technology. He writes about information politics and international affairs, and is the author of ten books, including The Managed Citizen, Pax Technica, and Computational Propaganda. He has won multiple book awards, and his research and commentary writing have been featured in the New York Times, Washington Post, and many international media outlets. He was named a “Global Thinker” by Foreign Policy magazine, and the National Democratic Institute awarded him their “Democracy Prize” for pioneering the social science of fake news. He has testified before the US Senate, UK House of Parliament, and European Commission on the impact of misinformation on human rights, media freedoms, and democratic values. His latest book is Lie Machines: How to Save Democracy from Troll Armies, Deceitful Robots, Junk News Operations, and Political Operatives. Currently, he is a Visiting Fellow at the Carr Center for Human Rights at Harvard University’s Kennedy School.

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Democracy
Technology and Society
Public Policy
Research Methods
International Affairs

Impact

News feature

Facebook and Twitter are being used to manipulate public opinion – report

Our case study series on computational propaganda worldwide was featured in the Guardian

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Topics Computational Propaganda Social Media

Op ed

Let’s Build Pro-Democracy Twitter Bots

Slate

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Topics Governance Social Media

Op ed · OCT 2017

Social media companies must respond to the sinister reality behind fake news

Research highlights need for paid political content to come with clear disclosures, write Philip Howard and[...]

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Topics Computational Propaganda

Op ed · Jan 2022

What’s Stunning about the Misinformation Trend — and How to Fix it

CNN

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Topics Computational Propaganda

Op ed · Feb 2021

To Quash Disinformation, Researchers Must Work With Journalists

Exposing and fighting the problem requires drawing from reporters’ resources and reach.

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Topics Computational Propaganda Political Communication

News feature

Conspiracy theorists, far-right extremists around the world seize on the pandemic

Civil rights advocates have warned for months that the coronavirus could aid recruiting for the most[...]

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Research

Data memo

Troops, Trolls and Troublemakers: A Global Inventory of Organized Social Media Manipulation

Cyber troops are government, military or political party teams committed to manipulating public opinion over social[...]

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Topics Hackers Social Media

Data set · MAY 22

External research example dataset

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Topics Arab Spring Artificial Intelligence Astroturf

Working paper

Global Attitudes Towards AI, Machine Learning & Automated Decision Making

Implications for Involving Artificial Intelligence in Public Service and Good Governance How do people perceive the[...]

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Topics Computational Social Science

Academic article

“Anything that Causes Chaos”: The Organizational Behavior of Russia Today (RT)

RT (formerly, Russia Today) is one of the most important organizations in the global political economy[...]

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Topics Political Economy of Media

Covid-Related Misinformation on YouTube

The Spread of Misinformation Videos on Social Media and the Effectiveness of Platform Policies Authors: Aleksi[...]

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Academic article

Predicting Engagement with the Internet Research Agency’s Facebook and Instagram Campaigns around the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election

The Russian Internet Research Agency’s (IRA) online interference campaign in the 2016 U.S. presidential election represents[...]

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Topics Social Media

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More about Phil Howard

Learn More about Professor Phil Howard