Profiles

Since being appointed the BBC’s first specialist disinformation reporter at the start of 2020, she has monitored the spread of viral misinformation and conspiracy theories across social media, and the consequences when they bleed into the real world. It has been a year which has seen her delve into corners of the internet where QAnon and anti-vax conspiracies thrive,

“I am very picky. Like everyone is with who they date. It goes through criteria. Are they exciting enough? Is there a buzz around them? Do we think they’re going to be big if they’re not already? Watching previous interviews, do they have charisma? Are they funny? All these different things.”

"It teaches you humility, and how to cope with defeats and disappointments. And that's a really important factor in life: you can't win everything."

"People do want women to be sexual, but not by their choosing. They want to look at an image of you and make it sexual."

“If you go to an auction, out comes the Picasso—dead silence. Once the hammer comes down on the price—applause. We live in a world where they applaud the price but not the Picasso”.

'We need to talk about who has money, how they got it, why they got it, who doesn’t, how that came to be and how all of those differences affect our individual experiences of the world, so that we can start thinking about what needs to be done about how money is made, and spent, and shared, because fundamentally it’s very unfair.'

"I don’t view myself as particularly underprivileged at home, I’m just a normal person, but when i get here, these are the people who have aspirations to be MPs, policy advisors, involved in powerful institutions, to run the country… but they’ve never met a person who comes from a family in the North, whose family income is less than the national average. That’s what scares me.”

Eight-year-old Robert Lefkowitz was a man (well, boy) with a plan. Inspired by his family physician, Dr Feibush, he knew he wanted to become...

“I guess the one thing that comes to mind is that change is a lot harder to make than you originally think it is going to be – which isn’t the most inspiring thing for me to say.”

Anyone who knows even a little about the London art market will know Frieze. Founded in 1991 as a contemporary art magazine by Oxford...

West End actor Harry Francis was six years old when he saw CATS for the first time. “I was obsessed with it,” he tells me,...

I log onto a zoom call to be greeted by an array of colours: placards from protests cascade down the walls, various rainbow objects...

"These ones are being told on my channel because no one else will tell them and I want to tell that story."

Series three of Sex Education cannot come soon enough. The hit show had over forty million households tune in to its first season, and I...

There’s something slightly surreal about emailing someone whose comedy routines regularly pop up on your Facebook feed, whose new hit comedy ‘Feel Good’ got...

I joined my Zoom call with Zac on a warm afternoon in the middle of March. The first time I came across Zac’s name...

There’s only one Catherine Cohen. It’s something you realise about five minutes into watching her perform — she’s just burped. “I’m sorry,” she says nonchalantly,...

Joining this zoom call, Luke is sat in his childhood bedroom with a bookcase overflowing in the background. Luke immediately starts chatting and smiling,...

Chelsea Fagan’s videos are credited for making me finally understand stocks — no small feat, since both economics teachers and my dear parents had...

When our Zoom call connects, Dom has his arm wrapped around the back of Dick’s chair. The pair are sitting in a normal-looking front...