Scholar in residence 6 – 16 October 2025
Will visit KTH 4 times during this academic year, for 2-3 weeks per visit. Initial visit 6-16 October 2025.
Vasilis Vlachokyriakos is a Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) Academic and Technology Designer with a background in Computer Science and Computer Security. He currently serves as a Reader of HCI and Digital Civics at Newcastle University, where he is currently the co-lead of the HCI research group, Open Lab. He is also the co-founder of Open Lab Athens, a Social Solidarity Economy research cooperative in Greece.
His work focuses on Community-Engaged Participatory Research, designing and developing digital technologies that foster cooperation, participation, inclusion, and democracy. He works in domains such as place-based civic engagement, participatory local governance, inclusive media, misinformation and content veracity, and user agency. In recent years, his research has focused on exploring and mitigating AI and algorithmically inflicted online harms (e.g. misinformation) particularly working with vulnerable populations and communities.
Over the last decade, he has been an investigator on projects totaling over £10M, securing grants and leading research initiatives in collaboration with technology, media, and international NGO partners, including BBC, Microsoft, IFRC and others. For more information visit his Newcastle staff homepage here or check his publications here.
The residency at the Digital Futures institute will give the opportunity to build on research in designing and developing civic data (data about and for a community) and civic AI-enabled technologies and systems, by working more closely with colleagues at Stockholm University and KTH. My experience of civic and community-engaged HCI research will complement existing interdisciplinary research of Digital Futures, as evidenced by my ongoing collaboration with several KTH and Stockholm-based researchers and academics such as Chiara Rossitto and Rob Comber. Such research agenda is of particular significance today, as the relationship between people, intelligent systems and public institutions, and issues of digital inclusion and digital governance are at the forefront of public discourse.
Collaborations with the local government, local research institutions and industry, will allow to extend this line of research upon the very topical and emerging issue of how the systems we design and build contribute towards more sustainable, safe, resilient and just societies through co-creating open knowledge, systems and services. More specifically, my residency will contribute to the DF priority areas/working groups of Smart Society – by bridging knowledge across UK and the EU on urban and rural informatics and digital civics research, Rich and Healthy Life – by better understanding the inclusion of underrepresented and vulnerable groups in the design and impact of AI systems in civic life (including healthcare), underpinned by the necessary cooperation across stakeholders, agentic and collaborative AI systems.
