Renée DiResta

Renée DiResta is a writer and research manager at Stanford Internet Observatory (SIO). DiResta has written about pseudoscience, conspiracy theories, terrorism, and state-sponsored information warfare. She has also served as an advisor to the U.S. Congress on ongoing efforts to prevent online and social media disinformation.

Education and career

Renée DiResta attended Stony Brook University of the State of New York and in 2004 received a Bachelor of Science Degree in Computer Science // Political Science.[1] Ms. DiResta has stated that as an undergraduate student she worked as an intern for the CIA, but that her association with that agency ended with her graduation in 2004.[2]

Until 2011 she worked in finance, as a trader at Jane Street Capital after which she worked in high tech venture capitalism firms until 2014. In 2015, Renée DiResta co-founded Vaccinate California, an organization designed to promote vaccination in California.[3] Di Resta was Director of Research at Yonder (formerly named New Knowledge), which was called to testify before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence about possible Russian interference in the 2016 Presidential election. Currently, DiResta is Technical Research Manager for the Stanford Internet Observatory, which monitors the Internet.

Vaccination misinformation

DiResta has advised the California State Senate on matters of vaccination misinformation. Following an outbreak of Measles in the U.S., DiResta began research into misinformation around vaccines. Along with data scientist, Gilad Lotan, DiResta identified that on Twitter, 25% of anti-vaccine information came from 0.6% of users, in a phenomenon DiResta described as similar to automation. This study additionally identified groups of individuals who would actively create false accounts and "shape public opinion about particular policies". This report was used by Vaccinate California and the California State Senate to demonstrate that the majority of Californians were in favor of removal of vaccine-opt out policies, resulting in California Senate Bill 277 passing into law.[4]

In 2021, the Virality Project, an organization DiResta is a part of, released the report "Memes, Magnets and Microchips: Narrative dynamics around COVID-19 vaccines" advising social media sites and health officials on how to counter COVID-19 and vaccine misinformation.[5]

Social media and disinformation

DiResta has previously written that social media sites, such as Facebook, Twitter, and Reddit, are used as "useful testing grounds for bad actors". Specifically, she wrote that foreign governments, such as Russia, will pilot memes and false stories online to see what can become popular and sway public opinion.[6] DiResta described it as "the asymmetry of passion" where extremist groups will intentionally attempt to reinforce narratives to "shape the reality" of viewers. This, according to DiResta, has seeped into the public policy of vaccines, zoning laws, and water fluoridation".[6]

During her ongoing tenure at the Stanford Internet Observatory, DiResta led investigations into the Russian Internet Research Agency’'s efforts to manipulate United States society and the GRU's efforts to influence the U.S. 2016 Presidential Election.[7] This included a report to the United States Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI), detailing the means by which the GRU used social media to influence the election and how social media poses an ongoing risk to US politics.[8] This report further stated that Facebook, Twitter and Alphabet's algorithms were intentionally manipulated in a multi-year effort by the Internet Research Agency, directed by the Russian government, and had successfully created false personas that spread misinformation to an estimated hundreds of thousands of Americans. The identified purpose of this effort was to "deepen political divisions".[9][10]

DiResta is a member of the Council for Responsible Social Media, a project of the campaign reform lobbying group Issue One.[11][12] She has criticized Mark Zuckerberg's controlling share of Meta and Elon Musk's Acquisition of Twitter, calling for greater transparency and regulation of false information spread on these sites.[13]

Media appearances

She appeared in the documentary The Social Dilemma and is a contributor at Wired and The Atlantic.[7]

She appeared on the podcast The Joe Rogan Experience.[14]

Literature
  • The Hardware Startup: Building your Product, Business, and Brand (2015)[15]

See also

References
  1. People Under 40 Stony Brook University.
  2. DiResta, Renee (Mar 31, 2023). "Fiction vs Reality: My Texts with Michael Shellenberger".
  3. "About – Vaccinate California". 2019-06-05. Retrieved 2022-05-16.
  4. "The Frontline Interview: Renee DiResta". FRONTLINE. Retrieved 2022-05-16.
  5. "Disinformation about the COVID-19 vaccine is a problem. Stanford researchers are trying to solve it". news.stanford.edu. 2022-02-24. Retrieved 2022-05-16.
  6. "The death of truth: how we gave up on facts and ended up with Trump". the Guardian. 2018-07-14. Retrieved 2022-05-16.
  7. "Renée DiResta". Conference on World Affairs. 2022-02-03. Retrieved 2022-05-16.
  8. DiResta, Renee; Shaffer, Kris; Ruppel, Becky; Sullivan, David; Matney, Robert; Fox, Ryan; Albright, Jonathan; Johnson, Ben (2019-10-01). "The Tactics & Tropes of the Internet Research Agency". U.S. Senate Documents.
  9. DiResta, Renee (n.d.). "Statement for the record from Renee DiResta, Director of Research, New Knowledge" (PDF). House Committee.
  10. DiResta, Renée (2018-12-17). "Opinion | What We Now Know About Russian Disinformation". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2022-05-16.
  11. Feiner, Lauren (October 12, 2022). "Facebook whistleblower, former defense and intel officials form group to fix social media". CNBC. Retrieved October 12, 2022.
  12. "Council for Responsible Social Media – Issue One". issueone.org. Retrieved October 12, 2022.
  13. Zuckerman, Renée DiResta,Laura Edelson,Brendan Nyhan,Ethan. "It's Time to Open the Black Box of Social Media". Scientific American. Retrieved 2022-05-16.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  14. "Joe Rogan Experience #1263 – Renée DiResta – [Unofficial] Joe Rogan Podcast". Retrieved 2022-05-16.
  15. DiResta, Renee; Forrest, Brady; Vinyard, Ryan (2015-05-20). The Hardware Startup: Building Your Product, Business, and Brand. "O'Reilly Media, Inc.". ISBN 978-1-4919-0710-8.
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