After six transformative years at UC Berkeley, Professor Hany Farid, a pioneer in the field of digital forensics, will be departing the School of Information effective June 30, 2026, to return to Dartmouth College, where he was a faculty member for two decades.
Farid joined UC Berkeley in 2019 with a joint appointment in Electrical Engineering & Computer Sciences and the School of Information. During his time at Berkeley, he became one of the most prominent and publicly engaged voices in the field, applying the rigor of his scholarship to some of the most urgent challenges facing society today: from digital forensics and deepfakes to the spread of online misinformation.
Among his many contributions to the university, Farid served as Associate Dean and Head of School for the School of Information in 2021, taking on a significant leadership role during a period of growth and change for the school. His research, spanning digital forensics, image analysis, misinformation, and human perception, drew wide attention from media, policymakers, and the public alike. He collaborated closely with news organizations, government, intelligence agencies, and technology companies on tools to detect manipulated imagery and stem the spread of harmful disinformation online.
Among his most notable contributions is his work on PhotoDNA, a system using robust hashing technology developed with Microsoft that is now widely used by internet companies to stop the spread of content showing the sexual exploitation of children. He is also co-founder and Chief Science Officer of GetReal Security, a company dedicated to combating AI-enabled fraud and misinformation.
Farid is the recipient of an Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship, a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship, and is a Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors. He is the author of Photo Forensics (MIT Press, 2016) and Fake Photos (MIT Press, 2019).
“Hany has been an extraordinary presence at the I School, as a scholar, a leader, and a colleague,” said Dean Eric T. Meyer. “Few researchers have done more to bring the rigor of their work to bear on the real-world harms of misinformation and digital manipulation. Hany’s contributions to the I School have left a lasting mark, and we are very grateful for everything he has given to this community.”
“I have valued and benefited from the deep expertise across the UC Berkeley campus,” said Professor Farid. “These collaborations have allowed me to expand my work into areas that would not have been possible elsewhere.”
“I have valued and benefited from the deep expertise across the UC Berkeley campus. These collaborations have allowed me to expand my work into areas that would not have been possible elsewhere.”
Prior to joining UC Berkeley, Farid was a faculty member at Dartmouth College from 1999 to 2019, where he was the Albert Bradley 1915 Third Century Professor of Computer Science and former chair of Dartmouth's Neukom Institute for Computational Science. He will rejoin the Dartmouth faculty on July 1, 2026, returning to Hanover having cemented his reputation as one of the foremost experts in the world on digital forensics and online trust and safety.
We thank Professor Farid for his many contributions to the I School and the broader information science community, and wish him all the best in this next chapter.
