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Speaker Biographies

Alan Rusbridger @arusbridger
Mr Rusbridger has been the editor of The Guardian since 1995. He is currently a visiting fellow at Nuffield College, Oxford and is also a visiting professor of history at Queen Mary’s College, London. Since he has been at the helm of The Guardian he has been involved in several high-profile investigations including the Neil Hamilton, Jonathan Aitken, Police Federation, and Trafigura cases. Under his leadership, The Guardian published the Snowden revelations on the NSA and its global counterparts’ surveillance activities.

Ian Katz @iankatz1000
Mr Katz is the editor of BBC’s Newsnight. He previously worked at The Guardian as a reporter, foreign correspondent, features editor, editor of the Saturday Guardian and deputy editor of The Guardian. Mr Katz supervised The Guardian’s investigation into the News of the World phone hacking scandal.

Cathy Newman @cathynewman
Cathy Newman is a presenter on Channel 4 News. She joined Channel 4 News in early 2006 after working at The Financial Times and The Independent. Her scoops at Channel 4 include the arrest of David Cameron’s aide Steve Hilton and the disclosure that illegal immigrants worked at the Home Office. Her Chris Rennard story provoked a crisis within the Liberal Democrat party  this year and she has a long track record at Channel 4 News and The Financial Times of digging out awkward stories on politicians. Ms Newman also writes for the FactCheck blog.

Tom Giles @BBCPanorama
Tom Giles is the editor of BBC Panorama. He was previously executive producer in the BBC Current Affairs unit.  Since he assumed the role of editor of Panorama in 2010, Giles has steered the show through a highly-acclaimed run of hard-hitting and controversial editions including an expose of FIFA, the Winterbourne Care scandal and a rigorous look at the BBC itself.

Stewart Purvis @StewartPurvis
Stewart Purvis is a professor of TV journalism at City University. Previously, he was editor-in-chief of ITN, and after retiring from his post, he became a visiting professor of broadcast media at Oxford University. Professor Purvis has advised the House of Lords Select Committee on Communications on the governance of the BBC. He is the author of ‘When Reporters Cross the Line’.

James Dean  @JamesDeanTimes
James Dean is an investigative business reporter for The Times. He has been nominated as business and finance journalist of the year in the 2013 Press Awards. Recently, he went undercover to break a story about a financial scandal at a major bank.

Anne McElvoy @annemcelvoy
Anne McElvoy is a journalist and public policy editor for The Economist as well as a columnist for the Evening Standard.  She is a former foreign correspondent and has written several books on Germany. She also is a broadcaster on BBC and regularly appears on Newsnight and Question Time.

Annette Dittert @annettedittert
Annette Dittert is the London correspondent for ARD, German TV. She has previously worked as a foreign correspondent and bureau chief in Warsaw, New York and London. She also has a video blog entitled ‘London Calling’ which reports on living in London and the truth of British stereotypes.

Laurie Penny @PennyRed
Laurie Penny is a columnist and blogger who writes for the New Statesman. She has previously written for Morning Star, and The Guardian. She is a feminist activist and author of Meat Market: Female Flesh Under Capitalism, published in 2011.

Claire Wardle @cward1e
Claire Wardle is a digital media consultant and was previously an Honorary Lecturer at Cardiff University. She was responsible for the design and development of the BBC’s social media training programme and has worked with a variety of government and business organisations on social media and community involvement training.

Michael Crick @MichaelLCrick
Michael Crick is Political Correspondent for Channel 4 News. He previously worked for the BBC and was a founding member of the Channel 4 News team in 1982.  Since his return to Channel 4 News, he has revealed that the 2012 ‘Plebgate’ scandal was based on false evidence and that Conservative politician Michael Mates had his file referred to the Crown Prosecution Service for alleged offences committed during the Hampshire and Isle of Wight police and crime commissioner elections.

Edward Lucas @edwardlucas
Edward Lucas is senior editor at The Economist, responsible for energy, commodities and natural resources coverage. His specialities include intelligence, cyber security and central and eastern Europe, where he has been stationed as a foreign correspondent in the past. He is the author of “The Snowden Operation”, published in 2014.

Steve Hewlett @steve_hewlett
Mr Hewlett is a presenter on BBC Radio 4’s Media Show. He is also a columnist for The Guardian and visiting Professor of Journalism and Broadcast policy at the University of Salford. Mr. Hewlett is also a board member of DocFest, the Sheffield International Documentary Festival. Recently, he has reported on press regulation and where the newspaper industry stands on the issue.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy @krishgm
Krishnan Guru-Murthy is a journalist and Channel 4 News presenter. He has previously worked as a presenter and producer at the BBC. Along with presenting Channel 4 News, he has anchored other special programmes including ‘Ask the Chancellors’ and  also presents the documentary series ‘Unreported World’ which has taken him to Yemen, Afghanistan and Iraq.

Richard Gizbert @AJListeningPost
Richard Gizbert is the presenter of Listening Post on Al Jazeera English. He previously worked for ABC News but was fired in 2004 after refusing to travel to Iraq to cover the 2003 US Invasion. He later won his wrongful dismissal case against the network. Recently he has presented on the NSA in the wake of Edward Snowden and on how technology is changing the face and content of news.

George Brock @georgeprof
George Brock is a professor and head of journalism at City University. He is the former managing editor of The Times. Professor Brock is a member of the executive board of the International Press Institute, chairman of the IPI’s British committee, and a board member of the World Editors Forum.  He is the author of ‘Out of Print: Newspapers, Journalism, and the Business of News in the Digital Age’.

Richard Sambrook @sambrook
Richard Sambrook is a professor of journalism and director of the Centre for Journalism, which undertakes postgraduate vocational training. He is a former director of BBC’s Global News, where he worked as a journalist for 30 years as a producer, editor, and manager. He has also been a visiting fellow at the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at Oxford University, where he undertook research into the future of international newsgathering and the place of impartiality and objectivity in the digital world.

Angela Phillips @AngelaELL
Angela Phillips is a Senior Lecturer  in the Department of Media and Communications at Goldsmiths University where she runs the print journalism programs and the Journalism MA. She previously worked as a journalist and photojournalist for national newspapers, magazines, television and radio. She is the chair of the Ethics Committee of the Coordinating Committee for Media Reform and has given evidence during the Leveson inquiry. 

Paul Bradshaw @paulbradshaw
Mr Bradshaw is the founder of Help Me Investigate, an investigative journalism crowdsourcing site. He also publishes the Online Journalism Blog and writes on social media, online and data journalism. In addition to writing, Mr. Bradshaw established the MA in Online Journalism at Birmingham City University and is a Visiting Professor of Online Journalism at City University London. His site, ‘Help Me Investigate’ assists journalists and members of the public as they investigate questions that involve the public interest.

Lyra McKee @LyraMcKee, @mediagazer
Lyra McKee is a freelance journalist and investigative reporter. She is the editor of Mediagazer and  the founder of The Muckracker, an investigative news blog for Northern Ireland. Lyra McKee considers government accountability her reporting focus and has frequently written on the importance of online security for investigative reporters.

Jonathan Stray @jonathanstray
Jonathan Stray is a journalist and computer scientist. He is a Fellow at the Tow Center for Digital Journalism at Columbia University where he teaches courses on computational journalism. He currently leads Overview, an Associated Press and Knight Foundation project, which is a tool that assists investigative journalists in analysing open-source document archives.

Eleanor Mills @EleanorMills
Eleanor Mills is a columnist and the Editorial Director of the Sunday Times. She is also Chair of ‘Women in Journalism’ and writes on social affairs, women and gender empowerment.

Camilla Long @camillalong
Camilla Long is a columnist, film critic and interviewer for the Sunday Times. She won interviewer of the year at the 2009 British Press Awards and in 2013, won Hachet Job of the Year.

Sue Llewellyn @suellewellyn
Sue Llewellyn is a journalist, social media consultant and Co-Founder of Ultra Social, a network of online communications specialists. She previously worked at the BBC as a TV producer and broadcast journalist.

Solomon Hughes @SolHughesWriter
Solomon Hughes is an investigative journalist, a columnist at the Morning Star and has written for major UK national broadsheets including the Observer, Guardian and The Independent.  He also writes for Private Eye and has reported on political party donors and allegations of bribery and tax evasion.

Alice Ross @aliceross_
Alice Ross is a reporter at the Bureau of Investigative Journalism and is project leader of the Bureau’s Covert Drone War project. The Covert Drone War team’s work has been recognised in the journalistic community and in 2013 the team won the Martha Gelhorn Prize for Journalism. Alice Ross has previously worked as a freelance reporter and editor. Her investigative work includes citizenship stripping and drone warfare oversight.

Samantha Barry @samanthabarry
Samantha Barry is a journalist and the Social Media Producer at the BBC. She also works as a social media consultant and a BBC Media Action trainer and has trained journalists and researchers in more than 30 countries in broadcasting, technology and social media.

Sarah Marshall @SarahMarshall
Sarah Marshall is The Wall Street Journal’s social media editor for Europe, Middle East, and Africa. She is the former technology editor at Journalism.co.uk. She is also co-organiser of Hacks/Hackers London and founder of Hacks/Hackers Brighton. Hacks/Hackers is a global movement with the aim of bringing together journalists and technologists to rethink the ways that information, news and technology will interact in the future.

Will Moy @puzzlesthewill
Will Moy is the Director of Full Fact, which specialises in fact-checking claims made by interest groups, politicians and the media. He previously worked as a researcher for a cross-bench peer. Will Moy recently appeared at the Leveson Inquiry, where he gave evidence on press ethics and standards.

Eric Newton @EricNewton1
Eric Newton is a journalist and the senior adviser to the president at the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. He previously worked as a managing editor and was the founding  president of the First Amendment Project, which helps citizens seeking access to government records. He is the author of ‘Crusaders, Scoundrels and Journalists’.

Luke Lewis @lukelewis
Mr Lewis is the UK editor of Buzzfeed. Previously he was editor of NME.com, an editorial music site and has written on culture and technology for the Guardian and The Daily Telegraph. He has spoken on the topics of social media and journalism and on whether social media and viral news may help or hinder news transparency.

Fatima El Issawi @elIssawi
Dr Fatima El Issawi is a Fellow at Polis and is leading the research project ‘Arab revolutions: Media Revolutions’ looking at the transformations in the Arab media industry under transitional political phases within the current uprisings.  She is the author of  the report “Egyptian  Media Under Transition: In the name of the regime… In the name of the people?” She also works as an independent journalist and freelance analyst.

Reem Maged @Reemmagued
Reem Maged is TV journalist for Egyptian ONtv. She was the host of the Egyptian talk show Baladna bel Masry until 2013and reported on political events during the Egyptian uprising and revolution. Her critical coverage of the military during the revolution led to her being summoned for questioning by the authorities and it was a day after an appearance on her show in 2011 that former Egyptian Prime Minister Ahmed Shafik resigned.

Rasha Qandeel  @RashaQandeelBBC
Rasha Qandeel is a TV and radio presenter at BBC Arabic. She has presented Talking Point and the News hour from locations such as Egypt and the Syrian border. She has also hosted Egyptian and international debates on behalf of BBC Arabic at the Frontline Club.

Mark Watts @MarkWatts_1
Mr Watts is the Editor-in-Chief of Exaro and the co-founder of the FOIA Centre, which specialises in ‘open-access law’ research.  He works as a journalist, author and television presenter and previously has worked as a reporter at several national newspapers. He has been responsible for revelations about MI6 lobbying, political party funding and is the author of ‘The Fleet Street Sewer Rat’.

Mark Thompson @OpenSocietyF
Dr Mark Thompson is Website and Reports Editor for the Program on Independent Journalism at the Open Society Foundation. He has consulted for both government and civil society organisations and has worked at the United Nations and the OSCE. His work on policy issues includes the importance of media pluralism. He is the author of 4 books, including” Birth Certificate: The Story of Danilo Kis”, published in 2013.

Thomas Hughes @thomasmhughes
Thomas Hughes is Executive Director of Article 19, which is dedicated to preserving freedom of expression and information. He is the former Director of Media Frontiers and Deputy Director of International Media Support and has worked on press freedom and human rights issues for the past 15 years.

David Aaronovitch @DAaronovitch
David Aaronovitch is a columnist for the Times and Chair of the Board of Trustees for Index on Censorship, which is an international organisation dedicated to defending the right to freedom of expression. He has previously written for the New Statesman and contributed to radio and TV programmes.

Kamila Varadzinová
Kamila Varadzinová is the UX Designer at Czech Radio. She is responsible for the development of websites and mobile applications and specializes in ensuring they are user friendly. She previously worked as a UX design consultant.

Jaakko Alasaarela @Zefsolutions
Jaakko Alasaarela is the CEO of ZEF Solutions. ZEF Solutions is the creator of VotingAid ®,  a tool designed tohelp people make educated decisions in elections and improving election transparency.

Cilla Benkö @CillaBenko
Cilla Benkö is the Director-General of Swedish Radio and a member of the European Broadcasting Union’s Executive Board. While at Swedish Radio she was an initiator of a web project, Journalism 3.0, on the future of media development and topics such as democracy, technology and journalism.

Susanne Gelhard
Susanne Gelhard is a journalist and reporter and is currently studio manager and foreign correspondent for ZDF, German TV, in London. She has previously been stationed in Warsaw and won several awards for her reporting during the Balkan War.

Mike Mullane @mikemullane
Mike Mullane is managing editor of Journalism Now and Media Now at Eurovision. He is a broadcast journalist and previously worked at the BBC and Swiss Radio International. He has also been involved in the development of tools, services and training conferences for European broadcasters and the European Parliament.

Jukka Niva, YLE TV @jukka_niva
Jukka Niva is Managing Editor for Finnish YLE TV Current Affairs.

Cordelia Hebblethwaite @CordeliaHeb, @BBCtrending
Cordelia Hebblethwaite is a member of the BBC social media team and writes for #BBCTrending and the @BBCtrending blog. She previously was a feature writer for the BBC World Service, and was based in Washington, D.C.

Paul Myers @researchclinic
Paul Myers is an internet research specialist and is the BBC College of Journalism’s Internet Research Specialist where he assists journalists with the online aspects of investigative work. He also runs The Research Clinic and trains journalists and media professionals in research techniques.

Rosie Waterhouse 
Rosie Waterhouse is the Director of the MA in Investigative Journalism and a Senior Lecturer in Journalism at City University. She is also a freelance journalist and investigative reporter and has worked for BBC Newsnight and The Independent. She recently wrote a series of investigative articles in Private Eye on the ‘Satanic Panic’.

Barbara Serra @BarbaraGSerra, @AJEnglish
Barbara Serra is a journalist for Al Jazeera English and has previously worked as a researcher and producer at the BBC. At Al Jazeera English, she works as a London anchor for the programme Newshour and has presented the programme People&Power.

Ray Colgan  @RayCOLGAN74
Ray Colgan is a news editor for EBU/Eurovision news and previously worked as a correspondent for RTÉ. While at RTÉ he reported from locations including Pakistan and the Jordanian-Syrian border.

Startups

William Stolerman, the News Hub @thenewshubber @TheNewsHub
Daniel James, Sourcefabric @Sourcefabric @daniel_h_james
Mariam Cook, PositionDial, @PositionDial
Wessel van Rensburg, Cura @wildebees
Daniel Nordh, Curator @danielnordh @curator_app
George Bevis, ShouldWe @GeorgeBevis

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