On Wednesday 7 October 2026, Yvonne McDermott Rees gave a lecture at the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, entitled 'Trust in User-generated Evidence in an Era of Artificial Intelligence: Insights from the TRUE Project'. Attended by over 60 participants, the talk covered the TRUE project's research with judges and analysis of case law, its mock jury studies, and insights from its psychology research. Yvonne said: "I am really grateful for this opportunity to shar

We are delighted to share that TRUE project postdoctoral researcher Dr Maryanne Brassil has been awarded a British Academy/Leverhulme Small Research Grant. The grant, funded by the Leverhulme Trust, will support a research project titled Persistence Beyond Belief: Can Irrelevant and Implausible Misinformation Distort Our Memories? The project will investigate whether debunked misinformation can distort perceptual details in memory, and whether those distortions shape later ju

Becca and Nuria have just published an article based on TRUE project research in Discourse and Society. Entitled "‘But, today, you’ve got to be beyond reasonable doubt’: The discursive negotiation of judicial directions in mock-jury deliberations in England and Wales", their article explores how mock jurors in our mock jury study understood and negotiated judicial directions. Here is the abstract: Drawing on a corpus of mock-jury deliberations from England and Wales comprisin

The TRUE project team is proud to announce that our wonderful colleague Anne Hausknecht passed her PhD viva earlier this month. Anne's thesis, The Search for Truth in an Era of Deepfakes: The Impact of Deepfakes on Trust in User-Generated Evidence in Accountability Processes for Human Rights Violations in Europe breaks new ground by providing the first in-depth, systematic study of the impact of deepfakes on legal systems trying international crimes and by advancing practical

Maryanne, Yvonne, Helen, and Alice have just published, 'Proving atrocity crimes with user-generated evidence: Insights from mock jurors' in the Journal of Criminal Justice. This piece presents some key insights from our mock jury research. Here is the abstract: This study examined how jurors evaluate user-generated evidence (UGE) within a legal decision-making context. As UGE assumes an increasingly prominent role in investigations, particularly those involving atrocity crim

Ruben at the EASP General Meeting in Strasbourg From 1-4 July 2026, Ruben attended the triennial EASP (European Association of Social Psychology) General Meeting, held in Strasbourg, France. During the conference (Friday, 03/07), he presented a poster detailing his first study, which investigated the impact of feedback interventions on confidence-accuracy calibration. Yvonne and Anne with the hosts and producers of Asymmetrical Haircuts Anne and Yvonne spoke to the Asymmetric

The TRUE project team has been busy over the past few months! Here are some highlights from May and June: May 2026: Bucharest, The Hague, Siracusa, Boulder L-R: Adelina Brad, Barrister and President of the Leaders for the Future Association; Mark Hill KC; His Excellency Giles Portman, Ambassador of the United Kingdom to Romania; Yvonne McDermott Rees; Aurel Ciobanu, Dean of the Bucharest Bar; Josh Kern, Barrister From 4-5 May 2026, the Bucharest Bar Association, The Honourabl

Kaja in her new academic home of Queen's University Belfast We are proud to share that Kaja Kowalczewska, MSCA Postdoctoral Fellow who joined the TRUE project team in Autumn 2025, has been awarded the Scholarship of the Minister of Science and Higher Education for Outstanding Young Researchers in Poland. This is one of the most prestigious national distinctions for early-career researchers in Poland. It recognises young scholars whose research record, publications, internatio

We are delighted to announce that our case law database now includes ICC cases. This addition can be found by clicking on the second tab at the top of the database file. Viewers can select 'view larger verson' to expand the entire database, or the 'expand cell' function to read the full text of any cell in the spreadsheet. As with our domestic case law database, the ICC cases tab provides invaluable information on what kind of UGE was introduced, arguments put forward by the

On March 20th, 2025, the TRUE Project team welcomed researchers from across the UK and Europe for an interdisciplinary workshop titled, ‘The Courtroom as a Linguistic Arena: Language, Law, and the Pursuit of Justice in Criminal Trials’. Hosted on Swansea University’s Singleton Campus, the event brought together scholars working across law, linguistics, psychology, and technology to examine courtroom discourse. Incorporating extended Q&A blocks at the end of each session, th

A new report, co-authored by TRUE PI Yvonne , provides the first comprehensive analysis of how AI chatbots are reshaping violence against women and girls (VAWG) in dangerous new ways. The Report strengthens calls for Government action on AI chatbots in the Policing and Crime Bill. The report, Invisible No More: How AI Chatbots are Reshaping Violence Against Women and Girls , adds to the TRUE project's research on the broader societal impact of Artificial Intelligence. It fin

A couple of new papers can be found on our Publications page . TRUE PI Yvonne McDermott, PhD candidate Anne Hausknecht, and former TRUE postdoctoral research associate Dr Alice Liefgreen recently published a paper ‘ New Evidence, New Challenges: ICC Judges’ Perspectives on User-Generated-Evidence and Judging in an Age of Artificial Intelligence ’ in Oñati Socio-Legal Series. This research explores how International Criminal Court (ICC) judges perceive user-generated evidence

The TRUE project team now has a YouTube channel ! Please like and subscribe! Yvonne McDermott Rees, Nick Waters, and Kaja Kowalczewska participated in a symposium on "Leveraging technology to respond to civilian harm in war: Algorithms, OSINT and Strategic Litigation" at Queen's University Belfast School of Law from 6-7- November 2025. Nick Waters has delivered training to staff and students at Swansea University on 8 October and 18 November. Has also delivered workshops to B

It is with deep sadness that I share that Advisory Board member Professor William Twining died on 9 October 2025, at the age of 91....

We were delighted to recently welcome two new excellent colleagues to the TRUE project team! Nick Waters joined the team in September...

TRUE team members Rebecca Jenkins (PhD student) and Prof Nuria Lorenzo-Dus (Linguistics Researcher and PhD Co-Supervisor ) recently...

The TRUE project team is delighted to announce our upcoming workshop titled " The Courtroom as a Linguistic Arena - Language, Law, and...

TRUE team members Maryanne Brassil (Postdoctoral Researcher), Helen Qiao (Research Assistant), and Ruben Lamers-James (PhD student)...

TRUE PhD candidate Anne recently contributed a piece on "The Impact of Deepfakes on Trust in User-Generated Evidence” to a forthcoming...

We are excited to announce the launch of the TRUE Database on User-generated Evidence . This first iteration (published 2025) covers...