WORKSHOPS
MONDAY, March 18
DEEPFAKES | CHEAPFAKES
Dren Gerguri
LOCATION: In-person at LBJ School of Public Affairs,
SRH 3.122
Participants will learn about the landscape of fake content creation and detection, including audio, video and image deepfakes, and also deepfake news and deepfake phishing. With the proliferation of advanced AI technologies, the ability to create hyper-realistic fake videos and images has become increasingly accessible, presenting new challenges for media authenticity and trust. In this interactive workshop, participants will explore the techniques used to create deepfakes and cheapfakes, as well as the potential implications for misinformation, privacy, and security.
Monday 3/18 15:30 - 17:00
Maximum of 25 participants
PUPPET MASTERS
John Hammond
LOCATION: In-person at LBJ School of Public Affairs
SRH 3.B7
Say we put our hacker hat on and we act as the adversary... how do these threat actors or scammers build out these fake accounts? With either misinformation, malware, cybercrime, social engineering and more -- we need to understand the offense to have a stronger defense. In this workshop we'll get hands-on and practical to craft our own sock puppet, and learn just how (scary) easy it is for bad actors. With that insight, we'll be better armed as a community to detect, identify and counteract misinformation alongside tactics & strategies for your own anonymity and security.
Monday 3/18 15:30 - 17:00
THREATCASTING
Multi-day Workshop
LOCATION: In-person at LBJ School of Public Affairs
SRH 2.126 Room A & B
Threatcasting uses input from social science, technical research, cultural history, economics, trends, expert interviews, and even a little science fiction to recognize future threats and design potential futures. During this human-centric process, participantsbrainstorm what actions can be taken to identify, track, disrupt, mitigate, and recover from the possible threats. Specifically, groups explore how to transform the future they desire into reality while avoiding an undesired future. The Threatcasting method also exposes what events could happen that indicate the progression toward an increasingly possible threat landscape.
Monday 3/18 15:30 - 17:00
WORKSHOPS
TUESDAY, March 19
TELEGRAM & THE FAR RIGHT
Bellingcat
LOCATION: In-person at LBJ School of Public Affairs, SRH 3.B10
This workshop will cover how to find, monitor, and archive content from Telegram, and several methods of using information extracted from Telegram in digital footprint investigations, using examples from Bellingcat investigations.
Tuesday 3/19 15:45 - 17:15
Maximum of 25 participants
FOREIGN INFLUENCE RISK INDEX
Deloitte
LOCATION: In-person at LBJ School of Public Affairs
SRH 3.B7
This workshop focuses on a foreign risk influence model to approach simulations and planning to help decision-makers, planners, and analysts be positioned to more effectively consider and understand disinformation and new information environments.
Tuesday 3/19 15:45 - 17:15
THREATCASTING
Multi-day Workshop
LOCATION: In-person at LBJ School of Public Affairs
SRH 2.126 Room A & B
Day 2
Tuesday 3/19 15:45 - 17:15
WORKSHOPS
WEDNESDAY, March 20
INFORMATION LAUNDERING
Bret Schafer (GMFUS)
LOCATION: In-person at LBJ School of Public Affairs, SRH 3.B7
Information Laundering: The use of digital methods to detect mirror, proxy, and amplification websites.
A consistent challenge in tackling the spread of disinformation, state-sponsored propaganda, and extremist content is our inability to effectively identify and evaluate the sources of information we encounter online. Low-cost digital publishing tools and online platforms allow malicious actors to spread false, misleading, and manipulated information through an ecosystem of cut-outs, proxies, aggregators, and amplifiers that can effectively mask the original source of information from information consumers. To tackle this problem, the Alliance for Securing Democracy (ASD) at the German Marshall Fund (GMF), the Institute for Strategic Dialogue Germany (ISD), and the University of Amsterdam (UvA) have developed a tool to detect similarities—both at the content and technical level—between seemingly unrelated websites. This workshop will introduce participants to the theories behind information laundering, the digital methods used to create the tool, and potential use cases.
Wednesday 3/20 10:30-12:00
Maximum of 30 participants
AD SENSE
Roman Osadchuk (DFRLab)
LOCATION: In-person at LBJ School of Public Affairs
SRH 3.B10
This workshop is designed to explore how social media ads can be used for the purposes of disinformation dissemination. The workshop will share the basics and best practices on how to approach investigations in analyzing ads, finding connections between websites, and exploring
ads on social media platforms like Facebook, TikTok, and Telegram. In the workshop, we’ll explore platforms' peculiarities and weaknesses, as well as approaches to tracking advertisements. The workshop would cover Ad Sense, ads.txt, Meta Ad Library, and other tools.
Wednesday 3/20 10:30-12:00
THREATCASTING
Multi-day Workshop
LOCATION: In-person at LBJ School of Public Affairs
SRH 2.126 Room A & B
Wednesday 3/20 10:30-12:00