IDSB member, James Fletcher and Olivia Brown, in their study "Working Lives with Dementia: A Digital Futures Perspective," argue that if organizations adapt and deploy digital technologies, they can help individuals with dementia continue their employment. Read more…

How Dr Joanna Syrda and Dr Oishee Kundu are using a novel approach to illustrate the business risks of neglecting online defences.

Threats and Trade-offs was developed as part of Discribe, a £3.5 million research collaboration between the Universities of Bath, Bristol and Cardiff, and Royal Holloway, University of London. Read more…

Prof. David Ellis has been invited by WaveLength UK to speak at a special parliamentary event titled "Rethinking Loneliness." This crucial discussion will focus on assessing the effectiveness of the UK Loneliness Strategy in light of growing concerns over rising loneliness across all age groups. Read more…

Dr. Olivia Brown, Deputy Director of the IDSB and Associate Professor in Digital Futures at the University of Bath, recently appeared on This Morning and BBC Breakfast to discuss the impact of online media on young people. She addressed the risks of radicalisation, hidden meanings in online emoji language, and the dangers of desensitisation from harmful content. Read more….

IDSB member Dr Olivia Brown’s research analyses online data to identify the risk that someone might take violent action offline.Read more…

As part of the Discribe project, IDSB members have developed a game called Threats and Tradeoffs that simulates the cybersecurity challenges faced by innovative start-ups. The game not only educates players about security challenges but also provides researchers with insights into attitudes toward decision-making, risks, and rewards. Read more…

IDSB member Aurelien Mondon and Johan Farkas from the University of Copenhagen collaborated on an article about the recent tech power shift in the US.

Professor Dame Angela McLean, Government Chief Scientific Adviser, will lead the launch of the University of Bath’s new Institute for Digital Security and Behaviour (IDSB), on Wednesday 29 January, at Bath’s Guildhall, in a keynote speech on Securing the Future. Read more…

The highly anticipated launch of the University of Bath’s new Institute for Digital Security and Behaviour (IDSB) took place at the Grade I listed Guildhall in Bath on 29 January 2025, with a keynote speech from the Government Chief Scientific Adviser, Professor Dame Angela McLean.

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IDSB PhD student Emily Godwin’s study analysing the cultural role of memes in online conspiracy communities has been published in the journal Social Media + Society.

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Researchers from the University of Bath’s Institute for Digital Security and Behaviour (IDSB) are taking a role in a major government-commissioned study to explore the impact of smartphones and social media on children’s wellbeing.

To learn more about the research project, read the press release published by the University of Bath here.

Congratulations to IDSB member Dr Oishee Kundu for winning Images of Research 2024 in Digital category!

The 2024 competition invited colleagues to submit an image and a short, plain English description to tell people about their research and its benefits to society. Read more….

Laura Smith is Deputy Director of the new network, which aims to help researchers understand how individual and population level security risks evolve. Read more….

UKRI announced today that Bath will co-lead a new Cybersecurity Research and Networking Environment (CRANE), a Cybersecurity NetworkPlus which aims to strengthen cybersecurity, realise the benefits of emerging technologies and better prepare society against future cyber threats. CRANE is supported by a £6 million investment from the UKRI Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC).  Bath project lead Adam will present on opportunities for members to engage when the Network+ launches in early Spring. Read more

Laura Smith is collaborating with colleagues at Princeton University and Cardiff University on the first project funded under US-UK Bilateral Academic Research Initiative (BARI) social science programme. IMITATE3 will lead to a fundamental change in our understanding of the construction, communication and consequences of foreign influence operations, and their capacity to induce political, cultural, and socio-economic instability and uncertainty..

The UK research team will receive up to £2.87 million from the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)

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Liv Brown’s research on identifying far-right terrorists from social media posts features widely in the media, see Financial Times. Liv will meet with the University's incoming Head of Public Affairs next week to discuss promoting her research to policy makers. Read the press release here

Institute Director Professor Laura Smith delivers her inaugural lecture ‘Progress, Peril and Polarisation: Mechanisms of Mobilisation in the Digital Age’ to a packed audience on the 12th June 2024. Watch the recording here

New project: Laura Smith is theme lead for Human Centred Design for a successful consortium bid, led by Bristol, for an UKRI AI hub, AI for Collective Intelligence (AI4CI). The human-centred design work stream is cross-cutting and leverages the expertise of the Institute. This is an £11m investment with nearly 30 government and industry stakeholders, so is strategically valuable and will bring significant opportunities to Bath

Huge congratulations to Institute members Danae, Laura, Aurelien, Brit and Alicia, and PhD students Dessi and Rob, who received Doctoral Recognition Awards this year for contributions to doctoral research. More...