Humanitarian AI Today

Voices is a new mini-series from Humanitarian AI Today. In daily five to fifteen minute flashpods we pass the mic to humanitarian experts and technology pioneers, to hear about new projects, events, and perspectives on topics of importance to the humanitarian community. In this flashpod, Ali Al-Mokdad, a humanitarian leader speaks with Humanitarian AI Today producer, Brent Phillips about his experimental AI-native podcast called “Quantum Humanitarian” which explores the intersections of humanitarian realities, diplomacy, technology, and global affairs. Unlike traditional formats, this series does not follow scripts written by Ali Al Mokdad. Instead, it is powered by AI reading, assessing, and analyzing Ali's work, research, articles, and webinars, turning those insights into structured conversations and deep explorations of key themes. This is the first AI-native podcast in the humanitarian and development sector, pioneering a new way of exploring complex global issues through AI. This experiment aims to visualize future workflows in the humanitarian sector and explore how agentic AI can represent human thought in the digital landscape. Ali shares several surprising observations from producing 29 episodes, noting that the AI hosts have become remarkably adept at identifying trends in his work and even mimicking his specific vulnerable yet data-driven style. Ali emphasizes that the primary challenge of AI is not the technology itself but the organizational transformation required to leverage it. He urges the humanitarian community to invest in learning and development rather than overestimating risks or underestimating the opportunities presented by these tools.

David Schoeller-Diaz, Impact Engagement Manager formerly with the CyberPeace Institute, joins Humanitarian AI Today producer, Brent Phillips, to discuss the urgent need to conceptualize cybersecurity and artificial intelligence as public goods rather than individual responsibilities. Drawing from twenty years of experience in the humanitarian and peace-building sectors, David highlights how grassroots organizations are currently targeted by sophisticated threats like ransomware and spyware without adequate systemic support. He advocates for a shift toward collective infrastructure, such as regional cybersecurity operations centers and mandatory platform responsibility, to protect the entire social fabric from the cascading impacts of cyberattacks. The conversation further explores how community engagement principles from David's work with UNICEF, including localization and building on local capacity, can be applied to AI governance. David warns against the dangers of corporate dependency and "parachuting" external experts into aid and development contexts, instead proposing a "community immunity system" powered by federated learning and blockchain to share threat intelligence while maintaining data sovereignty. Both speakers emphasize that authentic AI literacy and genuine partnerships with local technologists are essential to ensuring that emerging technologies support democratic civic spaces rather than reinforcing existing vulnerabilities.

Thomas Byrnes, CEO and Lead Consultant of MarketImpact, speaks with Brent Phillips, Humanitarian AI Today producer, about the growing challenge of "shadow AI" in the humanitarian sector. Byrnes defines shadow AI as the unauthorized use of AI tools like ChatGPT and Gemini by organization staff and field teams. While these tools offer benefits and productivity gains, their unofficial use introduces serious risks, such as the accidental sharing of sensitive beneficiary data, linguistic errors, poor decision making in aid and protection contexts, and "hallucinations" that might lead to incorrect assessments during program design. To mitigate these risks, Byrnes introduced AidGPT, a training brand that provides humanitarian teams with the skills to use AI tools ethically and safely. A central component of this training is the AI workflow card, an open-source toolkit designed to force users to pause and define the AI's role, set guardrails against misinformation, and verify outputs against approved data checklists. Byrnes emphasizes that while AI tools can provide much-needed efficiency in an underfunded sector, they must be treated like "junior staff members" who require constant supervision and human accountability. Ultimately, he argues for breaking the stigma and "shame" surrounding AI use to facilitate an open, community-wide dialogue about risks, operational best practices and lessons learned.

In Humanitarian AI Today’s first interview recorded in Spanish, David Alejamdro Schoeller-Diaz guest hosts a special interview with Catalina Rebollo, a journalist and regular contributor to Wired magazine in Spanish covering technology and artificial intelligence. Catalina specializes in in-depth reporting on news and complex issues with a particular focus on human rights, inequity and disinformation. She recently wrote on humanitarian technology under siege in Gaza, highlighting the impact of technology blockades and technology warfare on crippling humanitarian operations, making it harder for populations to survive and for aid agencies to fulfill their mandates. Building on the subject of technology in conflict-zones, David and Catalina discuss how digital tools and AI are becoming indispensable for humanitarian aid while at the same time they are being weaponized by non-humanitarian actors to facilitate the surveillance and persecution of civilians, testing humanitarian principles in new ways that we are only beginning to understand. Catalina highlights an emerging "two-tiered system" within the humanitarian sector, characterized by a stark disparity in technological capacity. While large, well-funded organizations possess the resources to conduct rigorous research into uses of AI and deploy more sophisticated and secure tools, smaller grassroots NGOs are frequently left behind. This digital divide often forces smaller actors to rely on insecure platforms and tools, leaving their operations and the communities they serve vulnerable to cyberattacks and data breaches. Power imbalance like these also severely limit the negotiating leverage of smaller NGOs not only with global technology corporations but also with key stakeholders on the ground during a crisis. The conversation concludes with a call for international political agreements to establish "red lines" that protect humanitarian data, much like the physical Red Cross flag protects aid workers under the Geneva Conventions. Looking forward, the guests explore the potential for defensive uses AI designed specifically to do things like safeguard human rights and provide medical guidance in conflict zones where traditional support has been severed. Finally, they call upon the academic and technology communities to deepen their engagement with the humanitarian sector, helping organizations of all sizes navigate the rapid evolution of AI and unlock its potential as a force for global good. Interview notes: https://humanitarianaitoday.medium.com/humanitarian-technology-under-siege-a-conversation-with-catalina-rebollo-from-wired-en-espa%C3%B1ol-c7f143c98c97

Voices is a new mini-series from Humanitarian AI Today. In daily five-minute flashpods we pass the mic to humanitarian experts and technology pioneers, to hear about new projects, events, and perspectives on topics of importance to the humanitarian community. In this flashpod, Radek Wierzbicki, CEO of Unsung Heroes, speaks with Humanitarian AI Today producer Brent Phillips about his team’s work connecting startups with humanitarian organizations and Unsung Heroes’ Humanity Badge initiative, a platform that builds the reputation of humanitarian and development workers and their organizations. They discuss Unsung Heroes’ core interests in advancing digital literacy and entrepreneurship and their work in Tanzania supported by the Polish Minister of Foreign Affairs and the Polish Embassy in Tanzania helping mentor young people interested in launching technology startups. They also discuss Unsung Heroes’ work distributing and training people on using computers and AI applications, and their work launching and partnering on technology incubators and accelerators advancing digital entrepreneurship. Substack notes: https://humanitarianaitoday.substack.com/p/radek-wierzbicki-from-unsung-heroes

In this episode of the Humanitarian AI Today podcast, Siem Vaessen, CEO of Zimmerman and an IATI Governing Technical Board Member, and Sylvan Ridderinkhof, Data Engineer at Zimmerman, joined Brent Phillips to discuss the critical intersection of artificial intelligence, open data, and humanitarian collaboration amidst a rapidly changing and advancing landscape. Drawing on insights from the NetHope Summit, the guests highlighted a consensus that the sector must collaborate more closely around AI and open data sharing, a necessity largely driven by significant cuts in aid funding. Siem, Sylvan and Brent discussed Zimmerman's long-standing commitment to the International Aid Transparency Initiative (IATI), an open data sharing framework widely used by humanitarian organizations to share granular information on aid activities, transactions and results. The discussion delved into Zimmerman's work and its future roadmap, focusing on enhancing the usability and quality of IATI data and on simplifying the complex process of reporting aid activities through IATI. They touched on the launch of Zimmerman’s updated AIDA (Aid Information Data Analytics) data platform and on other Zimmerman products and services tailored for the humanitarian aid and development communities and how they’re looking at ways of leveraging AI to improve search capabilities and support data enrichment processes. They also however caution listeners on risks posed by AI adoption, capable of potentially impacting IATI data quality and usability. Because AI models and agents aren’t natively trained to understand complex and subtle differences in ways that organizations report aid activities and publish their data, AI applications risk misinterpreting aid activity information. The use of AI applications to enhance and augment IATI data could add to these challenges, making complex, granular analysis of IATI data difficult or prone to misinterpretation without measures being taken to mitigate these risks . Ultimately, the guests stressed that the progress of humanitarian technology hinges not just on powerful tools but on responsible innovation and a greater commitment to collaboration, including actively engaging with local actors and organizations that may traditionally be excluded from technical discussions on uses of AI. Interview notes: https://humanitarianaitoday.medium.com/siem-vaessen-from-zimmerman-on-iati-collaboration-around-ai-and-the-development-aid-landscape-ebd36e0f20e9

Voices is a new mini-series from Humanitarian AI Today. In daily five-minute flashpods we pass the mic to humanitarian experts and technology pioneers, to hear about new projects, events, and perspectives on topics of importance to the humanitarian community. In this flashpod, Jessie Pechmann, Humanitarian GIS and Data Protection Lead with Humanitarian OpenStreetMap, speaks with Humanitarian AI Today producer Brent Phillips about satellite imaging, GIS, and the uses of AI in assessing building damage. They touch on how different AI models and methods can produce wildly different results for the same area, highlighting the need for transparency and better validation practices, including humans in the loop providing local knowledge and oversight. They also discuss the importance of "data commons," the open, shared data resources that humanitarian organizations rely on, and the challenges of supporting them amid a shift away from traditional government funding, which risks data becoming "siloed" as funding moves toward philanthropic or paid-for services. Substack notes: https://humanitarianaitoday.substack.com/p/jessie-pechmann-from-humanitarian

Yuriy Boyechko, Founder and CEO of Hope for Ukraine, speaks with Humanitarian AI Today guest host Emrys Schoemaker, Senior Director of Policy and Advisory with Caribou Digital. They discuss Hope for Ukraine’s work, humanitarian needs in Ukraine this Winter and the organization’s new mobile app (Nadiya) which helps connect individuals and families affected by the war with essential food supplies, education services, and housing resources. They also discuss ways of integrating applications of AI into the app and use the opportunity to discuss digital inclusion, digital identity and challenges associated with assessing needs, authenticating aid recipients and aid suppliers, and broader challenges associated with digital security. Episode notes: https://humanitarianaitoday.medium.com/yuriy-boyechko-on-hope-for-ukraines-new-mobile-app-nadiya-1b1ed5deb923

Voices is a new mini-series from Humanitarian AI Today. In daily five-minute flashpods we pass the mic to humanitarian experts and technology pioneers, to hear about new projects, events, and perspectives on topics of importance to the humanitarian community. In this flashpod, Olivier Mills, Founder of Baobab Tech, talks about NetHope’s Global Summit and Dev Explorer, a Frontier Tech Hub pilot project supported by FCDO, with Humanitarian AI Today producer Brent Phillips. They cover takeaways from NetHope’s recent Global Summit and conversations that took place focusing on rapid advances in AI and on the need to see humanitarian actors work more closely around AI from deeply technical vantage points. They also discussed Dev Explorer, open data sharing frameworks like IATI, explainable AI and new funding initiatives like Humanity AI. This conversation explores critical challenges that the humanitarian community faces in keeping pace with the rapid evolution of artificial intelligence. Olivier and Brent highlight the urgent need for humanitarian actors to move beyond high-level discussions and build new pathways for effective, deeply technical collaboration to harness AI's potential responsibly. Substack notes: https://humanitarianaitoday.substack.com/p/olivier-mills-from-baobab-tech-on

Voices is a new mini-series from Humanitarian AI Today. In daily five-minute flashpods we pass the mic to humanitarian experts and technology pioneers, to hear about new projects, events, and perspectives on topics of importance to the humanitarian community. In this flashpod, Cole Leng, an AI Researcher at Harvard and former Project Manager with Nexa AI, sits down with Humanitarian AI Today producer Brent Phillips to discuss the state-of-the-art and future trajectory of on-device machine learning. The discussion provides researchers and staff from humanitarian organizations with important insights into where the state-of-the-art in on-device machine learning stands today and where the cutting-edge is heading. Cole examines the critical trade-offs between on-device and cloud models, analyzing their respective workflows, performance limitations, and implementation considerations to help listeners evaluate whether on-device ML applications are suitable for their specific needs. He also offers insight into choosing LLMs, the impact of new specialized hardware on performance and capability, and how current advances in ML are shaping the next generation of applications. This episode highlights a core goal of the Humanitarian AI Today podcast: fostering dialogue between technology researchers and humanitarian practitioners. As AI and ML capabilities scale rapidly, this cross-sector engagement is crucial for mapping new technical advances to the unique operational, privacy, and resource constraints of the humanitarian field. Substack notes: https://humanitarianaitoday.substack.com/p/cole-leng-on-the-state-and-future

Voices is a new mini-series from Humanitarian AI Today. In daily five-minute flashpods we pass the mic to humanitarian experts and technology pioneers, to hear about new projects, events, and perspectives on topics of importance to the humanitarian community. In this flashpod, Neha Bajwa, Vice President of Product Marketing at Neo4j, joins Humanitarian AI Today producer Brent Phillips to discuss Neo4j’s major plans to support agentic AI systems that will directly benefit nonprofits and humanitarian organizations. Neo4j is the world’s leading graph intelligence platform for AI systems, and the company’s two new tools, Neo4j Aura Agent and the Model Context Protocol Server for Neo4j, will address critical development obstacles and help organizations rapidly build, test, and deploy AI agents. They also discuss Neo4j’s Graphs for Good program and Neo4j’s upcoming “NODES” developer conference, which is the biggest graph community gathering dedicated to applications, data intelligence, knowledge graphs, and AI. Substack notes: https://humanitarianaitoday.substack.com/p/neha-bajwa-from-neo4j-unveils-new

Voices is a new mini-series from Humanitarian AI Today. In daily five-minute flashpods we pass the mic to humanitarian experts and technology pioneers, to hear about new projects, events, and perspectives on topics of importance to the humanitarian community. In this flashpod, Lindsey Moore, Founder and CEO of DevelopMetrics, joins Humanitarian AI Today producer Brent Phillips to talk about agentic AI and bold new funding initiatives like Humanity AI. According to Humanity AI’s website, the coalition is co-chaired by Omidyar Network and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. Its founding members include the Doris Duke Foundation, Ford Foundation, Lumina Foundation, Kapor Foundation, Mellon Foundation, Mozilla Foundation, Siegel Family Endowment, and the David and Lucile Packard Foundation. Over five-years, the coalition plans to dedicate $500M towards making sure people and communities beyond Silicon Valley have a stake in the future of artificial intelligence establishing an AI future where people and communities can flourish. Lindsey Moore offers a grounded perspective on the current state of AI in the humanitarian sector. She observes that despite industry buzz, most organizations are not yet experimenting with agentic AI. Instead, they are focusing on more foundational challenges, such as organizing their data and building domain-specific large language models that can grasp the unique context and terminology of their work. Discussing the Humanity AI initiative, Lindsey and Brent express hope that such bold new funding can, with an informed understanding of the sector, help offset the destructive impact of recent aid funding cuts. These cuts disrupted foundational AI capacity-building that was being carried out by established organizations with deep domain experience, destroying numerous projects and dismantling teams behind them. They make a compelling case for funders to reinvest in these organizations and their important work to prevent hard-won gains from being lost and to scale their forward momentum. The conversation serves as a call to action, emphasizing that for initiatives like Humanity AI to be truly transformative, they must go beyond traditional philanthropy. This means proactively identifying and engaging with the humanitarian community's own AI leaders, reforming conventional cyclic grant solicitation and grant-making processes that too often overlook real sector innovators and builders, and boldly forming new partnerships that make them accessible and open to input, rather than insulated behind institutional firewalls. Substack notes: https://humanitarianaitoday.substack.com/p/lindsey-moore-from-developmetrics

Voices is a new mini-series from Humanitarian AI Today. In daily five-minute flashpods we pass the mic to humanitarian experts and technology pioneers, to hear about new projects, events, and perspectives on topics of importance to the humanitarian community. In this flashpod, Chelsea McMurray, founder of the AI security startup Dorcha, joins Humanitarian AI Today producer Brent Phillips to discuss international human rights law, AI security, and the threat landscape facing humanitarian actors. They begin with Chelsea’s background in human rights law and the recent disregard for international norms that should underpin ethical AI governance. The casual conversation then pivots to AI security and the specific threats humanitarian organizations face. Chelsea explains how her startup addresses data privacy vulnerabilities and prompt injection attacks, by giving users greater control over their personal information. Protecting such sensitive data is especially critical in the humanitarian sector, where information leaks can endanger field staff and the vulnerable populations they serve. Substack notes: https://humanitarianaitoday.substack.com/p/chelsea-mcmurray-on-ai-security-and

Voices is a new mini-series from Humanitarian AI Today. In daily five-minute flashpods we pass the mic to humanitarian experts and technology pioneers, to hear about new projects, events, and perspectives on critical topics. In this flashpod, Annie Brown, a Data Scientist with Humane Intelligence, talks about her team’s Bias Bounty program and how to get involved in an interview with Brent Phillips, Producer of Humanitarian AI Today. They discuss Humane Intelligence's work focusing on collaboratively designing and running rigorous evaluations that make AI systems more accountable, responsible, and fair, their bias bounty program and the strategy behind it as well as touch on how volunteers can get involved and launch their research. Substack notes: https://humanitarianaitoday.substack.com/p/annie-brown-from-humane-intelligence

Voices is a new mini-series from Humanitarian AI Today. In daily five-minute flashpods we pass the mic to innovators, researchers and practitioners on the humanitarian front lines, delivering real-time news on how they are building, testing and collaborating on uses of artificial intelligence. In this flashpod, Petya Kangalova, Technology Partnerships and Engagement Lead with Humanitarian Open Street Map joins Brent Phillips, Humanitarian AI Today podcast Producer, to discuss Humanitarian Open Street Map’s Technology and Innovation Working Group, its monthly working group open discussion sessions and how people can tune-in. Substack Notes: https://humanitarianaitoday.substack.com/p/petya-kangalova-introduces-humanitarian

Voices is a new mini-series from Humanitarian AI Today. In daily five-minute flashpods we pass the mic to innovators, researchers and practitioners on the humanitarian front lines, delivering real-time news on how they are building, testing and collaborating on uses of artificial intelligence. In this flashpod, Erica Gralla, an Associate Professor at George Washington University , shares news about a new project seeking to understand the impact of recent aid funding cuts on the humanitarian and development system. The study specifically looks at how major funding cuts to U.S. aid programs in 2025 are affecting the sector. She calls on listeners who work in aid or development to participate in the study by taking a "global pulse survey". This project brings together three professors from the fields of engineering, policy, and international relations. Their goal is to understand how the funding cuts are affecting relationships, coordination, information sharing, and supply chains across organizations. By tracking how the aid ecosystem is adapting, the team hopes to capture lessons from this challenging period and help the humanitarian community chart a path forward. Erica and Humanitarian AI Today producer, Brent Phillips, discuss the survey in detail, how people can get involved, what the research team expects to learn, and the project's next steps. Survey Link: http://go.gwu.edu/AidTrack Substack Notes: https://humanitarianaitoday.substack.com/p/erica-gralla-from-george-washington

Voices is a new mini-series from Humanitarian AI Today. In daily five-minute flashpods we pass the mic to innovators, researchers and practitioners on the humanitarian front lines, delivering real-time news on how they are building, testing and collaborating on uses of artificial intelligence. In this flashpod, Rich Woods, Global Fundraising Lead with Tech To The Rescue, joins Brent Phillips, Humanitarian AI Today Producer, to discuss the impact of artificial intelligence on fundraising and how Tech To The Rescue is adapting and leveraging AI while prioritizing authentic human interaction with grantmakers. They discuss Tech To The Rescue’s mission and evolution and speak in depth about how AI is challenging fundraisers. Rich emphasizes that while AI allows fundraisers to conduct deep research and personalize outreach on a massive scale, there is a significant risk of losing authenticity. Prospecting can generate vast amounts of information quickly, but the fundraiser may lack a genuine connection to the data. He stresses the importance of taking the time to "live" the research to ensure communications remain human-to-human. Looking toward systemic changes, Rich shares his hope that AI can help reform the fundraising process, which he calls a long-broken and resource-heavy system for nonprofits. Peering further into the future, Rich envisions AI applications acting as matchmakers, connecting funders and organizations with shared interests to facilitate open, valuable conversations and partnerships. Substack notes: https://humanitarianaitoday.substack.com/p/rich-woods-from-tech-to-the-rescue

Voices is a new mini-series from Humanitarian AI Today. In daily five-minute flashpods we pass the mic to innovators, researchers and practitioners on the humanitarian front lines, delivering real-time news on how they are building, testing and collaborating on uses of artificial intelligence. In this podcast episode, Bill Greer, Co-founder of Common Space joins Senior Geospatial Data Scientist, Gijs van den Dool to discuss Common Space’s work focusing on building open-licensed, freely accessible, high-resolution earth observation satellites dedicated to humanitarian aid. They discuss the project from technical vantage points and address core problems that Common Space aims to solve. They touch on the accessibility of satellites and data for use by humanitarian organizations and how aid funding cuts, structural changes in the commercial imagery market, limited observational capacity and competition combined with the critical need for the humanitarian community to avoid overreliance on third-parties for critical services, necessitate the development of initiatives like Common Space. Brent Phillips who produces the Humanitarian AI Today podcast incorporates a new question into the mini-series, asking Bill: If you were standing in front of a bold transformative philanthropist like MacKenzie Scott, what would be your argument for funding Common Space? Bill’s answer outlines the importance of providing the humanitarian community with guaranteed access to satellite imagery. Substack notes: https://humanitarianaitoday.substack.com/p/bill-greer-from-common-space-on-building

Voices is a new mini-series from Humanitarian AI Today. In daily five-minute flashpods we pass the mic to innovators, researchers and practitioners on the humanitarian front lines, delivering real-time news on how they are building, testing and collaborating on uses of artificial intelligence. In this flashpod, Shannon Farley, Co-founder and Executive Director of Fast Forward joins Eric Talbert, Co-founder of MedCycle Network to discuss Fast Forward’s 2025 AI for Humanity Report, which is a roadmap for harnessing AI for impact written by Fast Forward with support from Google.org. For over a decade, Fast Forward has supported social good initiatives, evolving with technology to become an important and direct accelerator of AI adoption in the social sector. Drawing upon its experience, the 2025 AI for Humanity report shows how nonprofits are using AI to transform lives and offers a roadmap for how to build on these successes responsibly. However, while AI has been able to create incredible efficiencies and opportunities, it also comes with new costs. The report reveals that a lack of funding is the most common obstacle for nonprofits, often preventing them from hiring the specialized tech experts they need to move uses of AI forward. Shannon emphasizes that philanthropy can directly address this gap. Even modest budget increases allow nonprofits to dramatically expand their reach, meaning an investment in a nonprofit's AI talent and infrastructure is a direct investment in scaling social impact. Substack Notes: https://open.substack.com/pub/humanitarianaitoday/p/shannon-farley-on-fast-forwards-2025?r=e9cbk&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false

Voices is a new mini-series from Humanitarian AI Today. In daily five-minute flashpods we pass the mic to innovators, researchers and practitioners on the humanitarian front lines, delivering real-time news on how they are building, testing and collaborating on uses of artificial intelligence. In this episode, Philippe Stoll, Senior "Techplomacy" Delegate with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), joins Humanitarian AI Today host Brent Phillips to discuss the complex issues that digital technologies create for humanitarian organizations and for people affected by conflict from an IT perspective. They discuss the growing pressure on organizations to experiment with AI, highlighting the significant backend IT effort required to safely deploy and maintain these systems. This deployment introduces new operational and security risks, demanding a highly cautious and ethical "do-no-harm" approach to protect vulnerable populations. Stoll also explains how the ICRC collaborates with academia to help evaluate new applications and find solutions to complex problems. Philippe closes with a call for greater cross-disciplinary collaboration, urging experts from humanitarian, academic, and technology sectors to engage with one another to better understand each other's perspectives. Notes: https://humanitarianaitoday.substack.com/p/philippe-stoll-on-ai-techplomacy