There is an increasing awareness of the harm unchecked social media causes, resulting in risks to children, polarisation and more. Join us for the online launch of CoCoDa (Concentration of Control and Data), where we’ll discuss the solutions to mitigate these risks caused by the high level of control and volume of data held by dominant online platforms.
In a series of lightning talks and Q&A panel discussion, we will introduce snapshots of solutions developed by numerous experts in the field, including ways of tracking platform data access requests and auditing methods to protect children online. We will also introduce our plans over the next 4 years as part of CoCoDa - our new international research collaboration.
In the lightning talks, we will share speedy overviews of some of our key projects. We will hear from other experts working in this field, before joining together for the panel. We are delighted to be hearing from LK Seiling, who will introduce work by the DSA Collaboratory, and Estelle Pannatier, who will share the work of Algorithm Watch.
CoCoDa brings together technical and legal experts across the University of St. Gallen, the University of Lausanne, Maastricht University and the Open Data Institute. The project aims to contribute to a robust toolkit of practical, technical approaches to ensuring platform accountability, with sufficient legal grounding. Among other areas, we will particularly focus on understanding recommender systems, and the technolegal landscape needed to achieve this.
Speakers
Chair: Professor Elena Simperl, Director of Research, ODI
Elena Simperl is one of the UK’s leading advocates for AI that is transparent, trustworthy, and truly human-centred.
As the ODI’s Director of Research and co-Director of King’s College London’s Institute for Artificial Intelligence (AI), she is in the AMiner top 2000 most influential scholars in AI in the world, and is the UK’s expert on building AI that works ‘for’ people, rather than just ‘on’ them. She is on Stanford University's list of "World's Top 2%" scientists.
Professor Simon Mayer, University of St.Gallen, Switzerland
Professor Simon Mayer is a Full Professor of Computer Science at the University of St.Gallen, Switzerland, and a Co-PI on the CoCoDa project. His research group (interactions.ics.unisg.ch) investigates technology-mediated interactions in complex socio-technical systems and applies this research from health to law to environmental sustainability. Within CoCoDa, his group focuses on the conceptualization and implementation of techno-legal tools that increase transparency and awareness on social media platforms and protect vulnerable users.
Luka Bekavac, Doctoral Candidate, University of St Gallen
Luka Bekavac is a doctoral candidate at the University of St. Gallen. His research focuses on understanding and addressing the systemic risks posed by Very Large Online Platforms, combining methods from computer science, tech law and social sciences to study how platforms personalized recommender systems influence us, while developing tools to enhance transparency and accountability in their operation.
Jake Stein, Research Associate, Open Data Institute; Doctoral Candidate, University of Cambridge
Jake is a PhD Researcher with the Human Centred AI group at the University of Oxford. He came to Oxford after a career working as a product manager and data analytics manager in silicon valley. At the Oxford Martin School he works as part of the Ethical Web and Data Architectures project under Sir Nigel Shadbolt and Sir Tim Berners-Lee. Jake’s research investigates how institutional power is mediated through technical infrastructures from user interfaces to web protocols and data structures. He designs alternative data architectures and policy to empower data subjects with the collective knowledge contained in their data.
LK Seiling, Researcher, DSA40 Data Access Collaboratory
LK Seiling earned a psychology degree from the University of Mannheim and continued towards master’s degrees in Cognitive Systems (University of Potsdam) and Human Factors (TU Berlin). At the Weizenbaum Institute since 2020, they co-led the Privacy Icons Project, are affiliated to the Digital News Dynamics research group, and now coordinate the DSA40 Data Access Collaboratory. Their research focuses on research engineering, data access, and the societal and scientific risks of digital technologies.
Estelle Pannatier, Policy Manager, AlgorithmWatch
Estelle is Senior Policy Manager at AlgorithmWatch CH. She holds a master's degree in political anthropology and communication and media sciences. Before joining AlgorithmWatch CH, Estelle has been involved in public policy development in the context of education digitalization in Switzerland. Prior to that, she had worked for the online voting advice platform smartvote, for the Swiss Department of Foreign Affairs FDFA, and for the Swiss Radio and Television.
The project is a collaboration bringing together expertise from the University of St. Gallen (Simon Mayer, Luka Bekavac), the University of Maastricht (Konrad Kollnig, Gijs van Dijck, Rouhollah Tari), the University of Lausanne (Aurelia Tamo-Larrieux, Alice Palmieri) and the Open Data Institute (Elena Simperl, Calum Inverarity, Jake Stein, Sophia Worth).