About
Principles
The Global Disinformation Index (GDI) aims to disrupt, defund and down-rank disinformation sites. We collectively work with governments, business and civil society. We operate on three core principles of neutrality, independence and transparency.
Neutrality: The GDI is non-political and non-partisan. Our Advisory Panel consists of international experts in disinformation, indices and technology. Our Technical Advisory Group provides best practice guidance for designing disinformation risk ratings that are unbiased, neutral and trusted. A Governing Board will be established to oversee our operations and accountability.
Independence: The GDI is a not-for-profit organisation based in the United Kingdom. Our funding comes from a range of sources including governments, philanthropies, and companies. No single funding source is to make up more than 33% of our total funding base.
Transparency: Our research methodologies and findings are in the public domain to review, debate and discuss. Our index methodology and process for selecting sites to review are published. All of our funding sources are made public. Our list of funders will be continually updated online.
Team
Our virtual team is made up of 15 experts from around the world, from Berlin to San Francisco. We are data scientists, data analysts, intelligence analysts, and researchers from a mix of backgrounds, including media, journalism, cybersecurity and adtech.
Please feel welcome to contact us: email: info@disinformationindex.org / Twitter @disinfoindex
Founders
Alexandra Mousavizadeh
Alexandra has 20 years’ experience in index construction and data analysis. She currently is the head of insights at Tortoise Media. Previously, she overaw the Legatum Institute’s flagship publication. Prior roles include CEO of Arc Ratings, a global emerging markets based ratings agency; Sovereign Analyst for Moody’s and head of Country Risk Management, Morgan Stanley.
Clare Melford
Clare is an experienced CEO in the commercial and not for profit sectors. She is an expert in building and managing cross-sector coalitions. Clare was formerly CEO of the International Business Leaders Forum and MD of MTV Networks, Nordics. She has worked on start ups in e-commerce, fin-tech and ed-tech. Clare is a founding board member of Girls not Brides, the global coalition to end child marriage.
Dr. Daniel Rogers
Danny is a physicist, an author, and an expert in cryptography, cybercrime, disinformation, and security. He is a co-founder of Terbium Labs. Previously, Danny managed a portfolio of physics and sensor research projects at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory. He currently teaches in the Cybercrime and Global Security Masters Program at New York University’s Center for Global Affairs and is a Security Fellow at the Truman Project on National Security.
Advisory Panel
Anne Applebaum
Professor in Practice and
Co-Director of Arena, LSE
Peter Pomerantsev
Co-Director of Arena, LSE
Miguel Martinez
Co-Founder and Chief Data Scientist, Signal Media
Technical Advisory Group
Camille Francois
Graphika
Scott Hale
Oxford Internet Institute / Meedan
Finn Heinrich
Open Society Foundations
Amy Mitchell
Pew Research Center
Miguel Martinez
Signal AI
Nic Newman
Reuters Institute of Journalism
Ben Nimmo
Graphika / Atlantic Council
Olaf Steenfadt
RSF/Journalism Trust Initiative
Cris Tardáguila
Poynter Institute’s International Fact Checking Network
Laura Zommer
Chequeado
Supported By
FAQs
What is disinformation?
We define disinformation according to the verb to disinform, which means “to purposely and/or maliciously mislead by spreading inaccurate information (in terms of the content itself and the context).”
What is the difference between misinformation and disinformation?
Both terms refer to false or misleading information. But misinformation lacks the intent to deceive, whereas disinformation is deliberate deception, often malicious.
How does GDI assess the risk of disinformation?
GDI risk ratings examine a range of neutral signals to flag the disinformation risk of a news domain. These signals include metadata and other observable factors. This rating is assessed using both artificial intelligence and human review. These processes are used to classify and rate the domains into different “at-risk” groups. For more details, please see our methodology paper.
How will the GDI risk ratings be used?
The ad tech industry, including advertisers, ad exchanges and platforms, can use these ratings to ensure ads for brands don’t appear on websites whose risk profile does not match their ad criteria. Ad exchanges will have real-time information on high-risk domains before placing ads on them. Social platforms and search engines will have a neutral assessment to make high-risk domains less visible on their platforms.
Who funds the GDI?
Our funding comes from a range of governmental, philanthropic and commercial sources. No single funding source is to make up more than 33% of the total funding base. Our current funders are list on this page and will be constantly updated.
Jobs
We are currently looking for short-term country researchers to help us risk rate sites in India, United Kingdom and the US.
We also always accept submissions of interest from candidates that want to work with us.
Contact
GDI welcomes all questions and queries. We can be reached at: info@disinformationindex.org.