Virtual Library

Our research repositories present a collection of open-source resources that showcase research and analysis that has directly influenced our initiatives. Non-IST publications are copyrighted by external authors not affiliated with IST.

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Reports

Cyber Incident Reporting Framework: Global Edition

Cyber Threat Alliance, Institute for Security and Technology

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Reports

AI-NC3 Integration in an Adversarial Context: Strategic Stability Risks and Confidence Building Measures

Alexa Wehsener, Andrew W. Reddie, Leah Walker, Philip Reiner

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Op-ed

The Nuclear Risk Reduction Approach: A Useful Path Forward for Crisis Mitigation

Sylvia Mishra

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Reports

Nuclear Crisis Communications: Mapping Risk Reduction Implementation Pathways

Sylvia Mishra

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Reports

Towards a Stronger Ukrainian Media Ecosystem

Leah Walker, Alexa Wehsener, Natalia Antonova

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Op-ed

Pentagon’s Office of Strategic Capital must win over Silicon Valley

Leah Walker and Alexa Wehsener

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Fact Sheet

DOD Establishes the Office of Strategic Capital

Strategic Balancing Initiative

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We also welcome additional suggestions from readers, and will consider adding further resources as so much of our work has come through crowd-sourced collaboration already. If, for any chance you are an author whose work is listed here and you do not wish it to be listed in our repository, please, let us know.

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Exploiting Emotions

Leah Walker and Zoë Brammer

SUMMARY

Digital systems exploit and manipulate emotions by design. Emotions prompt people to use digital tools, engage with content, products, and services, respond to advertisements, stay on or return to digital platforms, and even take action offline as a result of online experience. The design of the digital environment, especially its visual nature, also heightens user emotions, often creating an addictive cycle. Because emotions affect how we process, engage with, and often act upon information, they play a central role in the relationship between digital tools and democracy.

The DCDI team’s research into the relationship between digital tools and emotions includes three key insights: 

  • Cognitive openings created as a result of difficult life events create a moment of vulnerability. When presented with something that feels like it could solve your emotional problem and give you a purpose, people are easily isolated and radicalized. 
  • In social networks, the processes of recognition and status negotiation are intertwined with emotions; the more someone likes/links to your posts, the higher you will be ranked and listed in news feeds. As Javier Serrano-Puche puts it, “Since sharing emotions is essential for creating and maintaining social ties, somehow the status of social networks revolves around the emotions and feelings that users express about themselves, but at the same time find resonance among their circle of contacts.”
  • Digital technologies are affecting the cognitive processes that interact with emotional responses, including memory, attention, and reasoning.
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