In the past few years, generative artificial intelligence has become a larger part of the political conversation. Voters have had to learn about deep fakes and cheap fakes and how to identify them. They’ve had to evaluate whether a video clip is actually false, or whether the politician at the center of it is exploiting the public’s skepticism and only claiming it’s false. They’ve seen op-ed after op-ed offer conflicting advice on whether AI will ruin the world as they know it, or whether the panic is completely overblown.
Generative AI was at the center of a nuanced and wide-ranging conversation held by PEN America earlier this month that also touched on encrypted messaging apps, foreign interference operations, social media platforms, and declining distrust in institutions.
The panel was moderated by Nina Jankowicz, an author and researcher who leads the American Sunlight Project, an advocacy organization focused on fighting disinformation. Panelists included Roberta Braga, founder of the Digital Democracy Institute of the Americas; Tiffany Hsu, a disinformation reporter for The New York Times; Brett Neely, the supervising editor of NPR’s disinformation reporting team; and Samuel Woolley; a University of Pittsburgh professor and disinformation researcher.