Foreign Propaganda in the Age of AI

Bret Schafer

Topic: Foreign Propaganda in the Age of AI
Date: Tuesday, November 4, 2025
Place: Irondequoit Country Club: 4045 East Ave. [14618]
Time: 6:00 Cocktails; 7:00 Dinner; 8:00 Speaker Presentation followed by Q and A
Cost: $55 per person ($58 if paying online), buffet style. Cash Bar
Dinner: Buffet style – 2 protein options, 1 vegetarian option

***Registration Policy: For reservations, please email MemberServices@WACROC.org. Mail your
check for the dinner[s] to: WACR, PO Box 25462, Rochester, NY 14625 no later than October 28.

For the past decade, authoritarian states have used digital information systems to wage influence campaigns against West. The advent of artificial intelligence has improved the scale, scope, and sophistication of those efforts, allowing adversaries to spread propaganda, manipulate public opinion, and undermine democracies. This talk will explore the tactics, techniques, and technologies used by state and non-state actors to shape the modern information environment and what we are (or should be) doing to stop it.

Bret Schafer is a senior fellow and head of the Alliance for Securing Democracy’s information manipulation team. As an expert in computational propaganda, state-backed information operations, and tech regulation, he has spoken at conferences around the globe and advised numerous govern ments and international organizations.

His research has appeared in the New York Times, USA Today, the Wall Street Journal, and the Washington Post, and he has been interviewed on NPR, MSNBC, CNN, Al Jazeera, and the BBC. He also served as the co-chair of the inaugural board of the EU’s Foreign Interference and Malign Information Information Sharing and Analysis Center (FIMI ISAC).

Prior to joining GMF, he spent more than ten years in the television and film Industry, including stints at Cartoon Network and as a freelance writer for Warner Brothers. He also worked in Budapest as a radio host and in Berlin as a semi-professional baseball player in Germany’s Bundesliga. He has a BS in communications with a major in radio/television/film from Northwestern University and a master’s in public diplomacy from the University of Southern California, where he was the editor-in-chief of Public Diplomacy Magazine.