The New Trust Model in Photojournalism with the VII Agency: A Panel Event

VII+CAI+SCREENSHOTS.001.jpeg — VII and CAI partnered on a prototype with secure capture devices and three resulting case studies.

In our always-on digital age, we have an overload of information and inputs from myriad sources: some trusted, others unknown. This brings with it dueling outcomes, the possibility of more connectedness, understanding, and advancement, but also the threats of misinformation (unintended sharing of inaccurate content) and disinformation (intentional sharing of dishonest content). Images in particular are instantly communicative but can easily be manipulated and misrepresented.

Photojournalists have long been the target of distrust from the public – but now our digital content provenance model can signal trust and communicate accuracy of image history. So we partnered with the esteemed VII photo agency on a prototype to showcase this. Three of their photographers were given secure capture devices (created by Truepic with Qualcomm chips) to use in the field, along with the CAI Content Credentials feature in Photoshop to securely attach provenance data. Our SDK was integrated into their web platform to display attribution on their resulting case studies. Read more here on their site.

VII+CAI+SCREENSHOTS.005.jpeg — Photo by Ilvy Njiokiktjien shows Content Credentials. Click through to see more and inspect image details.

We brought together one of the photojournalists, Ilvy Njiokiktjien, VII founder Gary Knight, and our Head of Advocacy & Education, Santiago Lyon, for a panel discussion on December 8 about the project and the issues addressed by content provenance within photojournalism. NYU professor and Director of the Gallatin Photojournalism Lab, Lauren Walsh, moderated a candid look at how technology, provenance, trust, and photojournalism intertwine.

We’re sharing the full recording of the conversation here, and welcome your thoughts on the topics covered. We’re @ContentAuth on Twitter if you’d like to engage there. And as we continue our work, we welcome you to join us as a member of the Content Authenticity Initiative to participate in future events, keep up with our progress, and to help shape the future of content provenance at scale.