Understanding online harm and false information in Aotearoa

Topic: Understanding online harm and false information in Aotearoa

Description: This seminar will provide an overview of the key events, themes and tactics of coordinated online harm that have led to our current crisis of information integrity. Nicole will also discuss the impact this landscape has on different sectors and the challenges it creates for institutions, organisations and society as a whole. While Nicole can't promise to have all the answers for solving this issue, the talk will provide a clear framework for understanding a complex and multi-layered problem which impacts us all, and the factors which make it so difficult to solve.

Speaker: Nicole Skews-Poole

Nicole is a longtime communications lead who specialises in countering false information. After helping steer one of the first public sector responses to targeted harassment during the early days of COVID-19, she later worked as the Director of Communications for research group The Disinformation Project. 

Since founding Anchordown in 2024, she has been working with a diverse range of clients to support best-practice organisational responses to online harm and harassment. Her work is grounded in keeping your people safe, anchored in their values and purpose, and empowered to do what they do best, even in challenging environments.

She is part of the Christchurch Call Advisory Network (CCAN), a registered member of the Public Relations Institute of New Zealand (PRINZ)and the Facilitators Network NZ.