Kathleen Hall Jamieson, co-founder of FactCheck.org and director of the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania, will talk about political deception online and how to reduce it in an upcoming virtual talk presented by the Wayne Morse Center for Law and Politics.

The talk, “Facts Still Matter: Countering the Influence of Russian Hackers, Trolls, and ‘Viral Deception,’" will take place at 4 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 29. It is part of the Wayne Morse Center’s 20th anniversary celebration and is free and open to the public; registration is required.

Jamieson will explain the challenges Americans face as they wade through a deluge of information. She will offer big-picture solutions to reduce the level of deception and confusion in U.S. politics, as well as advice on how to avoid having personal credibility hijacked on social media.

“With the most consequential election of this century underway and disinformation flooding the airwaves and the internet, the center feels it is critical to amplify the voice of one of the country's most respected scholars addressing distortions in political communication today,” said Wayne Morse Center Co-Director Rebecca Dinwoodie Flynn. “Professor Jamieson is on the front lines exposing consequential misinformation and combating what she calls ‘viral deception.’”

Jamieson has years of experience educating the public on misinformation. She co-founded FactCheck.org in 2003 with the mission of being a “consumer advocate for voters that aims to reduce the level of deception and confusion in U.S. politics.”

She has authored or co-authored 16 books, including “Cyberwar: How Russian Hackers and Trolls Helped Elect a President,” which won the Association of American Publishers’ 2019 R.R. Hawkins Award; “Spiral of Cynicism,” with Joseph Cappella; and “The Obama Victory: How Media, Money and Message Shaped the 2008 Election,” with Kate Kenski and Bruce Hardy.

In 2020, the National Academy of Sciences awarded Jamieson its Public Welfare Medal for her “non-partisan crusade to ensure the integrity of facts in public discourse and development of the science of scientific communication to promote public understanding of complex issues.” In addition to directing the Annenberg Public Policy Center, Jamieson is also the Elizabeth Ware Packard Professor at the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania.

The talk is sponsored by the Wayne Morse Center for Law and Politics’ Public Affairs Speaker Series and the UO School of Journalism and Communication’s Center for Science Communication Research. It is made possible in part by the Richard W. and Laurie Johnston Lecture Fund.