Craig Albert, PhD
Graduate Director, PhD in Intelligence, Defense, and Cybersecurity Policy and Master of Arts in Intelligence and Security Studies
Dr. Craig Albert focuses on propaganda, information warfare, national security studies, cyberconflict, and political thought.
Gokila Dorai, PhD
Assistant Professor
Dr. Dorai’s area of expertise is mobile/IoT forensics research and developing a targeted data extraction system for digital forensics.
Lance Hunter, PhD
Professor of Political Science
Dr. Lance Hunter studies the connection between terrorism and political stability in democracies.
Michael Nowatkowski, PhD
Professor; Director, AU Cyber Institute
A leading cybersecurity expert available to discuss online security, ransomware, and device security topics.
Alexander Schwarzmann, PhD
Dean of the School of Computer and Cyber Sciences
Dean Schwarzmann is a nationally-recognized expert in cybersecurity of voting technology, computer science, and distributed systems.
Augusta University AI Experts
From election interference to ransomware to the hidden algorithms shaping public opinion, Augusta University faculty bring frontline expertise to the stories defining the AI era. Connect with our experts for timely insight and informed commentary.
Augusta University's faculty work at the intersection of AI research, national security and public policy, fields where the stakes of getting it wrong are high. The experts below are available for interviews, background briefings and breaking news commentary.
Meet Our AI Experts
Each of these experts is available across the story areas below. Find the angle that fits your next piece.
Disinformation, AI, and the Integrity of Democracy
AI has made it faster and cheaper than ever to generate convincing fake content, flood social media with coordinated narratives, and impersonate real people or institutions. Augusta University experts can help journalists explore how influence operations work, why they're effective, and what tools exist to detect and counter them.
Experts
Craig Albert — Propaganda, influence operations, AI-generated disinformation | School of Government and International Affairs
Lance Hunter — Political stability, election integrity, civil liberties | Department of Political Science
Cybersecurity in the Age of AI: New Threats, New Defenses
AI is changing the scale and sophistication of cyberattacks, from AI-assisted phishing to autonomous malware. At the same time, AI-powered forensics are helping investigators respond faster and surface evidence that would have been invisible before. Augusta experts can speak to both sides of this arms race.
Experts
Gokila Dorai — IoT forensics, AI-driven criminal investigation, device security | College of Science and Mathematics
Michael Nowatkowski — Ransomware, hardware security, defensive cyber operations | AU Cyber Institute
What the Public Needs to Know About AI
Most people encounter AI daily without knowing how to evaluate what they're seeing, whether it's a deepfake, a persuasive post, or an AI-generated image shared as news. Augusta experts can translate complex AI concepts for general audiences and offer practical guidance on digital literacy in an AI-saturated world.
Experts
Craig Albert — AI content recognition, political manipulation, public awareness
Gokila Dorai — How AI forensics work, what investigators can and cannot detect
Expert Perspectives
Your AI Questions, Answered
AI is reshaping daily life politics, and security, and the questions coming from the public reflect that.
Augusta University faculty respond to the questions people are actually asking.
- Taylor Swift recently took to her Instagram page to “set the record straight” about an AI version of her that had “endorsed” Former President Donald Trump. What are some of the things people can look for to know if a celebrity has indeed endorsed a candidate?
People can go to the celebrity’s social media page to see their recent social media activity. On the page, people can search for information regarding political endorsements. People should be aware that many fake and parody social media accounts exist for celebrities, so people need to make sure they locate the real social media accounts of the celebrity in question. Also, people can search reputable news sources to see if there is any verifiable information (i.e., the information has been verified by other reputable news sources) regarding celebrity endorsements.
- Can we tell the difference between real and fake where AI is involved?
There’s nothing the public can do in determining if the AI generated images or propaganda is real or not. So right now the public really just has to rely on the U.S. Intelligence community and the social networks, social media networks themselves to tell you if something is AI generated or if it’s been altered or might be a deepfake. The intelligence community of the United States has the capability to tell us something is a deepfake, for instance, through its reverse AI technology.
- How is AI a dangerous tool that's being used today?
AI is a very new tool that can influence people’s minds and influence elections overall. The first way AI can really damage and interfere with an election is through the use of what we call ‘deep fakes’. AI can be utilized to create fake pictures, fake movies, fake videos, with sound, that look and sound identical to the person they are trying to impersonate on the video.
- What are best practices for the public to decipher between AI generated posts and what's legitimate?
“One thing the average person can do is be very wary of what you’re seeing and ask yourself does this seem legitimate?” he added. “If everyone is saying the exact same thing, that’s a tell sometimes. Also, where does this information originate from and what are the timestamps on the posts? Something else is to look at the individual who made the post. Who are these people and who’s following them? You may be able to see if they are legitimate accounts.”
In The News
Augusta University experts are regularly called on by national and regional media to provide context on fast-moving AI stories.
A selection of recent coverage is below.
Using AI to Support Practice, Feedback, and Engagement
For this June Summer Short, Andrew Everett revisits three conversations about AI and course design. Dr. David Wiley discusses how generative AI may change the future of open educational resources by creating more customized learning conversations. Dr. Rafael Pacheco shares how an AI-powered adaptive learning tool can provide immediate feedback and support students with different levels of preparation. Arthur Takahashi, Jeff Mastromonico, and Andrew also return to the idea of vibe coding and how faculty can start small with AI-assisted building through announcements, content pages, study guides, and other low-risk course materials.
Artificial intelligence is advancing at a rapid pace, but with great power comes great responsibility. In this episode of In the Wild, we dive into the latest AI innovations and their ethical implications with Craig Albert, PhD, program director for Augusta University’s new Intelligence, Defense, and Cybersecurity Policy PhD program.
“If we’re thinking about the infrastructure to allow aid to be sophisticated and incorporated into security. These are states has a large number of data centers, very sophisticated data centers. Some of those data centers are housed outside the United States. But U.S. companies can access those. And also, U.S. has very sophisticated technology. They can relate to using A.I. in the area of security,” said Dr. Lance Hunter political science professor at Augusta University.