Chris Meserole
Director of Research - Artificial Intelligence and Emerging Technology Initiative
Fellow - Foreign Policy, Strobe Talbott Center for Security, Strategy, and Technology
Chris Meserole is a fellow in Foreign Policy at the Brookings Institution and director of research for the Brookings Artificial Intelligence and Emerging Technology Initiative. He is also an adjunct professor at Georgetown University.
Meserole's current research is focused on two major streams. The first is how democratic governments and societies should respond to the exploitation of digital technologies by both extremist movements and authoritarian regimes. He has written widely on the challenges posed by extremist recruitment and mobilization online, and serves as a co-facilitator of the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism’s working group on content-sharing algorithms. He has also advised a wide range of government offices on extremist use of the internet, as well as the Christchurch Call workstream on algorithms and radicalization.
Relatedly, Meserole has also published and spoken frequently on the rise of digital authoritarianism. As smartphones and remote sensors have proliferated, illiberal regimes have leveraged new forms of digital surveillance — typically under the pretense of counterterrorism and counter-extremism — to repress minority groups and human rights dissidents around the world. Meserole is particularly concerned with the global spread of Chinese surveillance infrastructure and governance models, which he described in a co-authored report on “Exporting Digital Authoritarianism” as well as testimony to a United States Commission on International Religious Freedom hearing on digital repression in China.
The second major stream of Meserole's research is focused on the use and impact of artificial intelligence within military applications. He is especially interested in the new norms, confidence building measures, and verification regimes that will be required to minimize the risks posed by AI-enabled military systems. Meserole has advised officials in the United States and Europe on ethical principles and policy frameworks for lethal autonomous weapons systems, and taken part in the US-China Track 2 Dialogue on AI Security led by the Brookings Institution and Tsinghua University.
Meserole's work has appeared or been featured in the New Yorker, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, Wired, and other publications.
Chris Meserole is a fellow in Foreign Policy at the Brookings Institution and director of research for the Brookings Artificial Intelligence and Emerging Technology Initiative. He is also an adjunct professor at Georgetown University.
Meserole’s current research is focused on two major streams. The first is how democratic governments and societies should respond to the exploitation of digital technologies by both extremist movements and authoritarian regimes. He has written widely on the challenges posed by extremist recruitment and mobilization online, and serves as a co-facilitator of the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism’s working group on content-sharing algorithms. He has also advised a wide range of government offices on extremist use of the internet, as well as the Christchurch Call workstream on algorithms and radicalization.
Relatedly, Meserole has also published and spoken frequently on the rise of digital authoritarianism. As smartphones and remote sensors have proliferated, illiberal regimes have leveraged new forms of digital surveillance — typically under the pretense of counterterrorism and counter-extremism — to repress minority groups and human rights dissidents around the world. Meserole is particularly concerned with the global spread of Chinese surveillance infrastructure and governance models, which he described in a co-authored report on “Exporting Digital Authoritarianism” as well as testimony to a United States Commission on International Religious Freedom hearing on digital repression in China.
The second major stream of Meserole’s research is focused on the use and impact of artificial intelligence within military applications. He is especially interested in the new norms, confidence building measures, and verification regimes that will be required to minimize the risks posed by AI-enabled military systems. Meserole has advised officials in the United States and Europe on ethical principles and policy frameworks for lethal autonomous weapons systems, and taken part in the US-China Track 2 Dialogue on AI Security led by the Brookings Institution and Tsinghua University.
Meserole’s work has appeared or been featured in the New Yorker, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, Wired, and other publications.
The White House and intelligence community don’t see eye to eye on the threat Putin poses, particularly in cyberspace, so the leaks are designed to tie Trump’s hands while also communicating to the Kremlin that Russia is even more vulnerable to cyber attacks than we are.
Xi’s regime views the internet as a tool for surveillance and suppression as much as communication.
The government needs to pay close attention to the technology’s effects on society as it is adopted in areas such as finance, education, law enforcement, and moderating online speech… [American leadership in artificial intelligence is built on diverse talent made up of] a small pool of folks, maybe ten to twenty thousand people, and a lot of those are foreign-born Americans. We’re going to need a sensible immigration policy to maintain our lead in AI.
