Azza El-Masri

Graduate Researcher

Azza El-Masri is a PhD candidate at the School of Journalism and Media, a graduate research assistant at the Technology & Information Policy Institute, and a graduate research fellow at the Center for Media Engagement.

Her research and work are informed by a commitment to advocating for ethical tech practices and design using participatory and ethnographic research. At TIPI, Azza is primarily involved in the Good Systems Being Watched project, which scrutinizes city regulation and ethical applications of AI-enabled smart city technologies in the United States.

Broadly, her academic endeavors at UT align with a mission to scrutinize the implications of technology–including smart city technologies, social media platforms, and encrypted messaging apps–on vulnerable users in fraught socio-political environments. Her academic work has been published in New Media & Society, Information, Communication, and Policy, and the Harvard Kennedy School’s Misinformation Review. She is a Fulbright Program alumna and a graduate affiliate with the Center for Information, Technology, and Public Life (CITAP) at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.