Centre for Digital Trust and Society Forum 2026

The Centre for Digital Trust and Society (CDTS) brings together interdisciplinary expertise from across the University of Manchester to examine the barriers and enablers of trust in digital technologies. Building on the success of our previous forums, this year’s event once again convenes national and international partners across our research clusters to reflect on emerging risks, share insights, and co‑create an inclusive vision for a safer digital future.

What to Expect

• Two keynote talks from distinguished experts working at the forefront of digital trust, online influence, and information integrity.
• Two thematic panels addressing the complex sociotechnical forces shaping today’s information environment.
• Lightning Talks from University of Manchester PhD & ECR community on trust and security issues in digital, government, industry, and civil society contexts.

Who Should Attend?

• Researchers and academics
• Public sector and policy professionals
• Industry practitioners
• Civil society and community organisations
• Anyone with an interest in digital trust, online safety, and information integrity

Keynote 1: Jonathan Hall KC, 6kbw College Hill

Online Content or Online Emotion: What is the Real Threat?

It can be argued that the true measure of the impact of the online domain is reach not speech, where reach is very often a function of emotional engagement, which frequently amounts to emotional manipulation.It is well-rehearsed that social media algorithms promote or tolerate angry engagement for commercial advantage, aided by news aggregators; and the hook of anger has been exploited for years in non-algorithmic sites like bulletin boards or games platforms.This means that the online domain is ripe for exploitation by terrorists and hostile states who spot local grievances and promote salient conspiracy theories, creating emotional engagement with their worldviews for tactical and strategic ends.Traditional labels of mis- and dis-information betray a focus on content but these are not secure categories, and on free expression grounds are generally unsuitable for top-down control by the authorities or tech companies.It follows that content-based moderation is incapable of dealing with plausible conspiracy theories that can be defended as free speech.Meta-analysis, such as spotting coordinated inauthentic behaviour, is one approach, but excludes organic dissemination. Attributing to foreign states is very difficult, so foreign interference is exceptionally hard to establish as a priority offence under the Online Safety Act.This is not to say that content in itself cannot pose a threat: instructional material is one example, and it is possible that frontier models will heighten the risk of truly dangerous information becoming available (e.g. CBRN).But unless academics and officials also consider the emotional aspects of online engagement - which includes speaking directly to people who have gone down the rabbit hole - they will miss a substantial part of the online domain's effect. This should involve developing moral and legal frameworks for when emotional manipulation is and is not acceptable.

Jonathan Hall is a practising barrister at 6kbw College Hill in London where he specialises in national security, asset recovery, crypto and law enforcement powers, and has been a kc since 2014. He was appointed by the home secretary as the independent reviewer of terrorism legislation in 2019, and as the uk's first independent reviewer of state threats legislation in 2024. These are (just about) part-time roles which he carries out from his chambers and from the home office. He has reported widely on the online domain, especially its impact on children, on how traditional laws apply (or not) to artificial intelligence, on countering social media falsehoods after attacks like the attack at southport, and writes frequently about online regulation. He is a visiting senior fellow at the centre for emerging technology and security at the Alan Turing Institute.

Keynote 2: Dr. Emma L. Briant, University of Notre Dame

Putting the Propagandist Back into Propaganda Studies

Dr. Emma L. Briant is one of the world’s leading experts on information warfare and propaganda. Her research analyzing propaganda, media and technology spans nearly two decades during which time she has taken on some of the most rapidly evolving and disruptive political challenges of our time and shaped policy and public debates.

Panel 1: International Hostile State Actors

Chair: Prof Stephen Hutchings, Professor of Russian Studies, University of Manchester

Panellist: Dr AIiaksandr Herasimenka, Lecturer in Data Science and Communication

Communication and Media, University of Liverpool

Panellist: Dr Nayana Prakash, Research Fellow, Chatham House

Panellist: Mr Vit Nagurnijs, Senior Analyst in FIMI and Domestic Threats, ExTrac AI

Since the 2008 financial crisis, we have witnessed a burgeoning crisis in the functioning of both global capitalism and the liberal democratic governance systems with which it is (contestably) associated. As the western nations championing them sink into decline, along with the global institutions whose establishment those nations oversaw, a powerful new axis of authoritarian states has risen to challenge and ultimately reshape the geopolitical order. Free of attachment to a single ideology yet fully plugged into the same vast digital networks as their adversaries, they opportunistically exploit the divisions in democratic societies to this end. They also strive to align with intra-democratic populist insurgencies epitomised by, but by no means restricted to, the Trump phenomenon. At the same time neoliberal economics have given birth to ‘big tech’ platforms with seemingly unassailable transnational reach and a business model driven by the logic of affect and sensation rather than truth and reason.

This panel focuses on the threat posed by hostile foreign state disinformation actors in the context of this disorienting nexus. It seeks to assess the level of the threat to democracy that they pose, the techniques that they employ, and the kinds of interventions that might impede them.

Panel 2: Misinformation, Disinformation, and Home Grown Online Influence

Chair: Prof Peter Knight, Professor of American Studies, University of Manchester

Panellist: Dr Katy Brown, Research Fellow in Language and Social Justice, Manchester Metropolitan University

Panellist: Dr Blyth Crawford, Project Manager, Moonshot

Panellist: Dr Allysa Czerwinsky, Research Fellow in AI Trust and Security, University of Manchester

In an era where digital platforms shape everyday social, cultural, and political life, online misinformation and hate speech have become pervasive, destabilising forces. While much public debate focuses on state sponsored information manipulation and Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference (FIMI), this roundtable shifts the lens toward the home grown ecosystem of misinformation, locally generated conspiracy theories, extremist narratives, and toxic online subcultures.

This panel addresses how grassroots mis/disinformation, polarising influencers, and algorithmically amplified hate speech collectively contribute to a fragmented and hostile online environment. The goal is to map the current threat landscape, examine the sociotechnical mechanisms that enable harmful narratives to spread, and explore practical interventions—educational, policy driven, and platform based—that can mitigate domestic online harms.

Join us for a day of thought‑provoking discussion, networking, and collaborative exploration as we work together to build a more trustworthy digital future.

Connect with the Centre for Digital Trust and Society

The Centre for Digital Trust and Society is a focal point for research across the University of Manchester that explores aspects of trust and security in our digital world. The Centre is part of Digital Futures, a highly interdisciplinary network which operates across the whole range of the University of Manchester's digital research.

About Digital Futures:

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Info: Putting the Propagandist Back into Propaganda Studies

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