
Alexa Koenig
Expertise
Digital ActivismHuman Rights
ICC and International Justice Mechanisms
Sexual Violence in Conflict
Violence against women
War Crimes
Women Human Rights Defenders
Details
Media
Breaks, grief and community: how to protect yourself when sifting through graphic visuals from Gaza and beyond Nov 17, 2023
Human Rights Center Leaders Offer Science-Based Advice on Processing Disturbing Imagery Berkeley Law Nov 7, 2023
11 Tips for Protecting Yourself From Upsetting Images on Social Media Greater Good Magazine Sep 19, 2023
How to Stop Doomscrolling and Find Meaning on Social Media Time Sep 15, 2023
Blue-Check Blues and Trauma X-Posure: Coping with Viral Violence World Affairs Podcast Aug 7, 2023
Meta’s Oversight Board Recommends Major Advance in International Accountability Just Security Jun 22, 2023
Crowdsourcing digital war crimes evidence Washington Lawyer Sept/Oct 2022
Bellingcat: The online investigators tracking alleged Russian war crimes in Ukraine 60Minutes CBS May 15, 2022
Can technology bring Vladimir Putin to justice? Washington Post Apr 18, 2022
Can a Tweet be evidence? Grid News Apr 11, 2022
Could social media hold evidence of alleged Russian war crimes? CBC Apr 7, 2022
Is 2022 the Year of Genocide? Recent Events at the ICJ Suggest Yes Coauthor OpinioJuris Apr 4, 2022
War Crimes Tribunals in the Digital Age NPR On the Media Podcast Mar 18, 2022
Digital detectives scour Ukraine social media for evidence of Russian war crimes Politico Mar 4, 2022
Surveilling the Surveillers: How New Tech Aids the Investigation of Human Rights By Alexa Koenig You Tube lecture Neukom Institute Nov 2, 2021
Q&A on Court Ordering Facebook to Disclose Content on Myanmar Genocide Just Security Sept 24, 2021
Myanmar Military Killing Protestors PBS Newshour May 26, 2021
Big Tech Can Help Bring War Criminals to Justice: Social Media Companies Need to Preserve Evidence of Abuse Foreign Affairs Nov 11, 2020
The Gap Between the Promise and the Practice of the United States Profile in Medium, 4 July 2020
Alexa Koenig Profile in Atlas Women April 14, 2020
Whose Stories Get Told, and By Whom? Representativeness in Open Source Human Rights Investigations OpinioJuris Dec 19, 2019
Fake News v. Fact: The Battle for Truth The Economist You Tube Feb 21, 2019
Activism 2.0: Can Social Media be Used to Solve War Crimes? Berkeley News Nov 5, 2018
Human Rights Advocacy in the Dawning Age of AI: Interview with Dr. Alexa Koenig, Executive Director, UC Berkeley Human Rights Center, Medium, Feb 15 2018
Truth in a Post-Truth World Bellingcat Film documentary
The Resistance San Francisco Magazine, Jan 23, 2017
Arrest Bashir: How the Sudanese Leader is Getting Away with Murder coauthor Foreign Affairs July 13, 2016
Genocide with Impunity The Open Mind PBS You Tube July 2, 2016
Capturing Karadzic: How the Butcher of Bosnia and his First-in-Command Escaped Justice—and Finally Got Caught coauthor Medium Mar 24, 2016
Radovan Karadzic and the (Very) Long Arc of Justice coauthor Foreign Policy Mar 24, 2016
‘When I returned home, it was another hell’: Now’s the time to talk about what we do after Guantanamo Salon Feb. 25, 2016
Alexa Koenig: Human Rights Today The Exchange April 27, 2015
The International Criminal Court at RightsCon: Upping its Cyber Game Huffington Post Mar 11, 2014
Department of Justice ‘White Paper’ Full of Contradictions U.S. News and World Report Feb 6, 2013
From Marin to the Hague, Working for Justice Berkeley News Center April 30, 2013
Alexa Koenig (@KAlexaKoenig) PhD, JD, is co-executive director of the Human Rights Center (@hrcberkeley), (winner of the 2015 MacArthur Award for Creative and Effective Institutions) and a lecturer at University of California Berkeley School of Law. She teaches classes on human rights and international criminal law with a focus on the impact of emerging technologies on human rights practice.
She co-founded the Human Rights Center Investigations Lab which trains students and professionals to use social media and other digital content to strengthen human rights advocacy and accountability. She co-authored with Andrea Lampros the 2023 book Graphic: Trauma and Meaning in our Online Lives.
Alexa is a member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science’s Committee on Scientific Freedom and Responsibility, co-chair of the Technology Advisory Board of the Office of the Prosecutor at the International Criminal Court, co-chair of the International Bar Association’s Human Rights Law Committee’s Technology and Human Rights working group, a member of the University of California’s Presidential Working Group on Artificial Intelligence (for which she is also co-chair of the human resources subcommittee), an inaugural member of the Technology Advisory Board for the Innovation Lab at Human Rights First, and a member of the board of advisors for Mnemonic/the Syrian Archive.
Alexa has been honored with several awards for her work, including the United Nations Association-SF’s Global Human Rights Award, the Mark Bingham Award for Excellence, the Eleanor Swift Award for Public Service, the Phi Beta Kappa Northern California Teaching Excellence Award, and as a 2020 Woman Inspiring Change by Harvard Law School.
She directed the development and was a member of the Coordinating Committee for the Berkeley Protocol on Digital Open Source Investigations, and has conducted trainings on online open source investigations for the Institute for International Criminal Investigations, UC Berkeley’s Advanced Media Institute, attorneys for the International Criminal Court, and others.
Her research and commentary have appeared in the Annual Review of Law and Social Science, Foreign Policy, Foreign Affairs, US News and World Report, and elsewhere. Recent books include Digital Witness: Using Open Source Methods for Human Rights Investigations, Advocacy and Accountability with Sam Dubberley and Daragh Murray (Oxford University Press, 2019), Hiding in Plain Sight: The Pursuit of War Criminals from Nuremberg to the War on Terror with Eric Stover and Victor Peskin (UC Press, 2016), Extreme Punishment: Comparative Studies in Detention, Incarceration and Solitary Confinement, editor with Keramet Reiter (Palgrave MacMillan, 2015), and The Guantánamo Effect: Exposing the Consequences of U.S. Detention and Interrogation Practices, contributor with Eric Stover, Laurel Fletcher, and Stephen Smith Cody (UC Press, 2009). Additional research and commentary have appeared in the Annual Review of Law and Social Science, the International Encyclopedia of the Social and Behavioral Sciences, Foreign Policy, Foreign Affairs, US News and World Reports, and elsewhere.