Jeff Kao is a computational journalist at ProPublica who uses data science to cover technology. His collaboration with The New York Times on Chinese government censorship of the coronavirus outbreak was a part of the newspaper’s winning entry for the 2021 Pulitzer Prize for public service. His project on videos posted to Parler during the Capitol riots was cited throughout President Donald Trump’s second impeachment hearing and won the 2021 IRE Award for breaking news. His work has also won the Loeb Award for international reporting (2022), the SOPA Award for journalistic innovation (2022) and the SABEW Award for technology reporting (2019).
Kao previously worked as a machine learning engineer at Atrium LTS, where he developed natural language processing systems for legal services. He holds a law degree from Columbia Law School, where he was the editor in chief of the Columbia Science and Technology Law Review, and a bachelor’s degree in engineering from the University of Waterloo.
Thanks to government loopholes, rail companies haven’t been scrutinized by the Federal Railroad Administration for scores of alleged worker injuries and at least two deaths.
With the gutting of content moderation initiatives at X, accounts with blue checks, once a sign of authenticity, are disseminating debunked claims and gaining more followers. Community Notes, X’s fact-checking system, hasn’t scaled sufficiently.
Railroad companies have penalized workers for taking the time to make needed repairs and created a culture in which supervisors threaten and fire the very people hired to keep trains running safely. Regulators say they can’t stop this intimidation.
Several patients complained to the church or the state licensing board about inappropriate touching during therapy sessions. It was years before the therapist gave up his license.
A group of services, often connected to pricey college counselors, has arisen to help high schoolers carry out and publish research as a credential for their college applications. The research papers — and the publications — can be dubious.
Google’s ad business hides nearly all publishers it works with and where billions of ad dollars flow. We uncovered a network containing manga piracy, porn, fraud and disinformation.
We identified websites that collected Google ad revenue despite publishing false claims about COVID-19, climate change and other issues in apparent violation of Google policies.
The Wuhan lab at the center of suspicions about the pandemic’s onset was far more troubled than known, documents unearthed by a Senate team reveal. Tracing the evidence, Vanity Fair and ProPublica give the clearest view yet of a biocomplex in crisis.
Tao Liu’s criminal odyssey took him from money laundering in Mexico to a massive scam in China to Trump’s exclusive New Jersey golf club. Investigators believed he may have infiltrated U.S. politics as part of a Chinese intelligence operation.
Xizhi Li pioneered a new method that enriched Latin American drug lords and China’s elite. A DEA investigation found the Chinese government may have been involved.
Experts say a recent wave of pro-Putin disinformation is consistent with the work of Russia’s Internet Research Agency, a network of paid trolls who attempted to influence the 2016 presidential election.
The “precinct strategy” widely promoted by Steve Bannon has already inspired thousands of Trump supporters to fill local GOP positions, intent on preventing a “stolen election.”
Online, the country’s propagandists have promoted a vision of the Games free of hostility or controversy. For example: The New York Times and ProPublica have identified over 3,000 inauthentic-looking Twitter accounts that appear in on the effort.
Celebrated scientist Joe Tsien retreated to China after his university and the U.S. government began investigating him. He says he’s a victim of anti-Asian discrimination, but key parts of his story don’t add up.
A ProPublica/Washington Post analysis of Facebook posts, internal company documents and interviews, provides the clearest evidence yet that the social media giant played a critical role in spreading lies that fomented the violence of Jan. 6.
Chinese propaganda officials have tried to shape the global discussion of the tennis player Peng Shuai’s accusations and disappearance, but their top-down strategy has largely stumbled.
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