Sam Gregory
Sam Gregory is an internationally recognized, award-winning human rights advocate and technologist and expert on smartphone witnessing, human rights work using video and technology, deepfakes, media authenticity and generative AI.
He has testified to both Houses of the US Congress on AI and synthetic media, and is a TED speaker on how to prepare better for the threat of deepfakes .
Currently Executive Director of the global human rights organization WITNESS, he has over twenty years experience at the forefront of practices, impact and innovations in video, technology, human rights, civic participation and media.
Sam initiated the first globally focused effort to 'Prepare, Don't Panic' around deepfakes and multimodal generative AI and is widely known and consulted as an advocate, researcher and speaker on deepfakes, Generative AI's promise and perils, innovation in how to understand media authenticity and provenance, and emerging forms of mis/disinformation.
“A longtime human-rights advocate, Gregory is a leading authority on deepfakes and other forms of A.I.-generated misinformation and disinformation. He focuses on preparing countries and communities for how doctored videos and manipulated media could be used to justify coups, jail innocents, and spark conflict.”
’33 Leaders Standing Up To Big Tech in the Age of AI’, The Chronicle of Philanthropy
In 2024, Sam proudly accepted the first ever Peabody Global Impact Award, recognizing how WITNESS has evolved repeatedly over the years, "tirelessly championing the power of emergent media technologies in defense of human rights around the world', and has "profoundly changed the world for the better"
Quoted in the New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, the Guardian, MIT Tech Review, The Atlantic, the BBC, the Economist, and WIRED.
Media appearances on ABC, PBS, CBC-Canada, the BBC, CNN, Al-Jazeera, NHK.
Invited to brief the National AI Advisory Council, and to testify on AI and deepfakes before the US Senate Commerce Subcommittee on Consumer Protection, Product Safety and Data Security and the House Oversight Committee Subcommittee on Cybersecurity, Information Technology and Government Innovation.
Keynotes for the 2023 TrustCon Trust and Safety Professionals Association conference, the 2023 Trusted Media Summit, Content Authenticity Initiative Summit, WEXFO and TED Talk at TED.
Featured on the first episode of the TED AI Show: Is AI Destroying Our Sense of Reality?