Alerts and Warnings Using Social Media: Current Knowledge and Research Needs

A Workshop DRAFT AGENDA

Irvine, CA February 28-29, 2012
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 28, 2012 7:30 8:30 Breakfast Welcome and Opening Comments Denis Gusty, Department of Homeland Security Bob Kraut, Chair, Committee on Alerts and Warnings Using Social Media 9:00 Fundamentals of alerts, warnings, and social media What do we already know about alerts and warnings and disaster response? Dennis Mileti, University of Colorado, Boulder What do we know about the use of social media during a disaster? Wendy Harman, American Red Cross What technologies are in development for alert dissemination and situational awareness via social media? Emre Gunduzhan, John Hopkins University Moderator: Michele Wood and Tim Sellnow 10:30 Dynamics of social media The social aspect of these tools makes them especially attractive because of the ability to leverage the trust people place in their connections. Information about an event that is provided by neighbors, colleagues, friends, or family is often viewed as more credible than a mass alert or a news report. Social media may also provide a useful complement to other tools by providing a way to rapidly disseminate time-sensitive information that maybe important to an affected community but not rise to the level of an official alert or warning. How connections form, how information is disseminated, and why users volunteer their time and knowledge to solve problems has been examined by a collection of HCI, psychology, and computer scientists. What motivates people to participate in knowledge sharing? What drives self-organizing? What mechanisms exist for self-correction of information?

Influence mechanisms in social media Duncan Watts, Yahoo! Incentivizing participation in time-critical situations To be determined Hashtags: Making Social Media Meet Your Needs Chris Messina, Google (invited) Shifting social media dynamics during a crisis Patrick Meier, Harvard Moderator: Jon Kleinberg Noon 1:00 Lunch Credibility, Authenticity, and Reputation During disasters, citizens often post first-hand information and pictures while also reposting information (official and otherwise) to a wide-variety of social media sites. Not only can this information be valuable to emergency officials but other citizens may use this information for decision-making or confirmation purposes. Information verification and rumor control Paul Resnick, University of Michigan Training the public to provide useful data during a disaster David Stephenson, Independent Consultant Mechanisms for Determining Trustworthiness Dan Roth, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign(invited) Moderator: Leysia Palen

2:30

Personal Privacy The use of social media by emergency officials raises privacy concerns that were not present with traditional methods of sending alerts and warnings. Also privacy-sensitive, but of potential value to emergency managers, is official monitoring of social media to better detect or understand unfolding events. Additionally, the networked nature of social media may provide a substantial amount of information about a single individual. For example, based on who one follows on twitter one could infer where they live or work and where their children may attend school. Some questions in this space include: What are ways to manage perceptions and expectations of privacy? For example, the communications being monitored by government officials, while technically public, may have been sent with certain expectations of privacy such as not being intended to be read by government officials. What is the appropriate balance of interests between achieving effective situational awareness and privacy? For example, how should location data and information associated with it be handled? What are best practice in providing adequate notice to the public and ensuring that collected information is used appropriately? For example, how can or should users whose

public information is being monitored be made aware of that? How frequently should notice be provided? Are there existing features of social media that could be used to help protect privacy? For example, would asking people to use designated tags (i.e., hash tags in Twitter) on information they intend to be read by government officials constitute an adequate opt-in approach?

Privacy decision making Lorrie Cranor, Carnegie Mellon University Trust and Privacy Gloria Mark, University of California, Irvine(invited) Implementation of See Something, Say Something campaign how privacy can be protected Bryan Ware, Digital Sandbox Privacy framework for monitoring social media To be determined Moderator: Alessandro Acquisti 3:45 4:00 5:30 Break Breakout discussion on opportunities and challenges. Need specific question for the groups. Reception

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 29, 2012 7:30 8:30 9:30 Breakfast Report backs from breakout sessions Case Studies of Uses of Social Media in Disasters Social media is already being used formally, and informally, by emergency management personnel. Researchers have also begun to examine the variety of communication streams, post-event, to learn how social media is used during a disaster. This session would provide an opportunity for both empirical and first-hand knowledge on the use of social media to be shared. Currently used tools for monitoring social media for situational awareness Bryan Humphrey, LA Fire Department. Use of Twitter for earthquake detection and alerting Paul Earle, USGS National Earthquake Information Center The use of social media tools to disseminate information during a health crisis Keri Lubell, Center for Disease Control Moderators: Leslie Luke and Richard Muth

10:30

Opportunities and Challenges The use of social media for disasters encompasses a wide variety of technical and human resources. Not only will social media provide a new avenue to provide alert and warnings but also Social media by design supports wide participation, allowing people to comment on official messages and to share their own observations about current events--including not only text but also images and video. As a result, social media open new avenues for those directly affected by a disaster to become a key information source about the event for other members of the community as well as emergency managers. How will social media fit into the broader context of alerts and warnings? How robust and reliable are social media (and the wireline and wireless networks they depend on)? What segments of the population do they reach? How do these compare to other channels for reaching the public? What are the implications for use in a disaster? What are best practices for collecting and analyzing social media data to create situational awareness? What changes in preparation, management, and analysis will be needed to incorporate social media as an information tool? Murray Turoff, New Jersey Institute of Technology Legal perspectives on First Responder Responsibilities Aram Dobalian VHA Emergency Management Evaluation Center (invited) Spontaneous and Organized Digital Volunteerism in the Future of Emergency Management Leysia Palen, University of Colorado, Boulder

11:30

Roles that social media services can play in providing alerts and warnings [staff member], Facebook Claire Diaz Ortiz, Twitter (invited) Nigel Snoad, Google Moderator: Bob Kraut

12:30

Plenary Discussion Denis Gusty, DHS Robert Kraut, Carnegie Mellon University Patrick Meier, Harvard University

1:00 pm

Adjorn/Lunch