The Hoover Institution's Project on Taiwan in the Indo-Pacific Region held The Fimi Challenge: Countering Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference in Taiwan and the United States on Monday, March 9, 2026 from 2:00 - 5:00 PM PT.
The FIMI Challenge in Open Societies
This event explored the practice of foreign information manipulation and interference (FIMI) in democracies in Taiwan and the United States, and the responses of both country’s governments, private companies, and civil society organizations to this challenge.
In Taiwan, the threat of influence and interference from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in its information ecosystem looms large. The Taiwan government has struggled to develop an effective response while balancing respect for civil liberties and freedom of speech: a tension manifested in the decision in December 2025 to ban the social media platform Rednote (xiaohongshu).
In the United States, efforts during the Biden administration to limit the spread of COVID misinformation online – some of it clearly tied to foreign influence campaigns originating in the PRC – led to a political backlash, and as a consequence some social media companies have taken a more passive approach to FIMI. At the same time, however, motivated by worries about PRC influence and data security of American citizens, the US Congress passed a law requiring the Chinese company Bytedance to divest from its popular platform TikTok or face a government-imposed ban in the US market. With a compromise agreement now brokered by the Trump administration, TikTok remains available in the United States, but the underlying concerns about social media platforms as vectors for PRC influence remain.
This symposium brought together several experts from Taiwan and the United States who discussed the FIMI challenge, including the efforts of private social media companies, civil society organizations, and governments in both places.
In Taiwan, the threat of influence and interference from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in its information ecosystem looms large. The Taiwan government has struggled to develop an effective response while balancing respect for civil liberties and freedom of speech: a tension manifested in the decision in December 2025 to ban the social media platform Rednote (xiaohongshu).
In the United States, efforts during the Biden administration to limit the spread of COVID misinformation online – some of it clearly tied to foreign influence campaigns originating in the PRC – led to a political backlash, and as a consequence some social media companies have taken a more passive approach to FIMI. At the same time, however, motivated by worries about PRC influence and data security of American citizens, the US Congress passed a law requiring the Chinese company Bytedance to divest from its popular platform TikTok or face a government-imposed ban in the US market. With a compromise agreement now brokered by the Trump administration, TikTok remains available in the United States, but the underlying concerns about social media platforms as vectors for PRC influence remain.
This symposium brought together several experts from Taiwan and the United States who discussed the FIMI challenge, including the efforts of private social media companies, civil society organizations, and governments in both places.
About the Speakers
Jerry Yu is a senior analyst at Doublethink Lab, where he specializes in conducting digital investigations and analyzing influence operations. In 2022 and 2024, Jerry has extensive experience in observing influence operations during both local and national elections, including training part-time analysts, managing data collection processes, and publishing reports based on the findings.
Drawing from his elections observation experience, he has collaborated on cross-national projects by sharing the experience and knowledge with journalists, NGOs, and researchers across South, Southeast, East Asia, and the Pacific region. The collaborations are to expose the techniques of influence operations used by threat actors and share the intelligence together. During the Ukrainian-Russian war, he tracked the propaganda spread by the PRC and published a report, ‘Analysis: How Ukraine has been Nazified in the Chinese information space?’
Before joining the Doublethink Lab, he was a research assistant at the Center for Survey Research Center at the Academia Sinica, Taiwan, where he combined traditional social scientific methods with computational approaches to analyze the process, dynamics, and effects of human communication behaviors through the integration of user log and self-reported data from survey or experiment.
Jerry graduated from the Graduate School of Criminology at the National Taipei University, and is also trained in crime spatial analysis with the Temple University in the United States for a semester. He is also a co-producer and co-host of the “Jianghu 543” podcast, which provides insights into the lives of individuals in Taiwan’s criminal justice system.
Drawing from his elections observation experience, he has collaborated on cross-national projects by sharing the experience and knowledge with journalists, NGOs, and researchers across South, Southeast, East Asia, and the Pacific region. The collaborations are to expose the techniques of influence operations used by threat actors and share the intelligence together. During the Ukrainian-Russian war, he tracked the propaganda spread by the PRC and published a report, ‘Analysis: How Ukraine has been Nazified in the Chinese information space?’
Before joining the Doublethink Lab, he was a research assistant at the Center for Survey Research Center at the Academia Sinica, Taiwan, where he combined traditional social scientific methods with computational approaches to analyze the process, dynamics, and effects of human communication behaviors through the integration of user log and self-reported data from survey or experiment.
Jerry graduated from the Graduate School of Criminology at the National Taipei University, and is also trained in crime spatial analysis with the Temple University in the United States for a semester. He is also a co-producer and co-host of the “Jianghu 543” podcast, which provides insights into the lives of individuals in Taiwan’s criminal justice system.
You-Hao Lai is a practicing lawyer currently pursuing his doctorate at The George Washington University Law School. He currently serves as Deputy Director of the Democratic Governance Program at DSET. His research explores legal and policy responses to the challenges posed by digital authoritarianism to cybersecurity and the free flow of information. He is actively engaged in various civil movements related to technology regulation and human rights protection. Before joining DSET, he worked at the Cogito Law Office, a prominent firm specializing in public interest litigation in Taiwan. Additionally, he served as a legal and policy advisor to the President of the Judicial Yuan, Taiwan’s highest judicial organ. He holds LL.M. degrees from the National Taiwan University College of Law and Harvard Law School.
Wei-Ping Li earned her Ph.D. from the Philip Merrill College of Journalism at the University of Maryland. She serves as an adjunct lecturer at Merrill College and works as a researcher with UMD's Maryland Democracy Initiative. Li is also the research director at FactLink, a Taiwan-based organization dedicated to OSINT (open-source intelligence) investigations and enhancing digital literacy among Chinese-speaking communities.
Li's research focuses on the transnational dissemination of false information, conspiracy theories, propaganda and content moderation policy. From 2024-25, she held the position of postdoctoral researcher at UMD, collaborating with Dr. Sarah Oates and Dr. Naeemul Hassan on the "Disarming Disinformation" program, which is coordinated by the International Center for Journalists (ICFJ). Li was also a research fellow at the Taiwan Factcheck Center (TFC) from 2023-25.
Before pursuing an academic career in journalism, she provided consulting services on digital human rights in Asia. She also previously worked as a journalist covering financial and legal topics in Taiwan for several years.
Li is a licensed lawyer in New York state. She earned her LL.M. (Master of Laws) degrees from the University of Pennsylvania Law School and Soochow University (Taiwan), as well as a Master of Arts degree in journalism from National ChengChi University (Taiwan).
Li's research focuses on the transnational dissemination of false information, conspiracy theories, propaganda and content moderation policy. From 2024-25, she held the position of postdoctoral researcher at UMD, collaborating with Dr. Sarah Oates and Dr. Naeemul Hassan on the "Disarming Disinformation" program, which is coordinated by the International Center for Journalists (ICFJ). Li was also a research fellow at the Taiwan Factcheck Center (TFC) from 2023-25.
Before pursuing an academic career in journalism, she provided consulting services on digital human rights in Asia. She also previously worked as a journalist covering financial and legal topics in Taiwan for several years.
Li is a licensed lawyer in New York state. She earned her LL.M. (Master of Laws) degrees from the University of Pennsylvania Law School and Soochow University (Taiwan), as well as a Master of Arts degree in journalism from National ChengChi University (Taiwan).
Graham Webster is a research scholar in the Program on Geopolitics, Technology, and Governance and editor-in-chief of the DigiChina Project at the Center for International Security and Cooperation at Stanford University. He researches, writes, and teaches on technology policy in China and US-China relations.
Before bringing DigiChina to Stanford in 2019, he was its cofounder and coordinating editor at New America, where he was a China digital economy fellow. From 2012 to 2017, Webster worked for Yale Law School as a senior fellow and lecturer responsible for the Paul Tsai China Center’s Track II dialogues between the United States and China and co-taught seminars on contemporary China and Chinese law and policy. While there, he was an affiliated fellow with the Yale Information Society Project, a visiting scholar at China Foreign Affairs University, and a Transatlantic Digital Debates fellow with New America and the Global Public Policy Institute in Berlin. He was previously an adjunct instructor teaching East Asian politics at New York University and a Beijing-based journalist writing on the Internet in China for CNET News.
Webster holds a bachelor's in journalism and international studies from Northwestern University and a master's in East Asian studies from Harvard University. He took doctoral coursework in political science at the University of Washington and language training at Tsinghua University, Peking University, Stanford University, and Kanda University of International Studies.
Before bringing DigiChina to Stanford in 2019, he was its cofounder and coordinating editor at New America, where he was a China digital economy fellow. From 2012 to 2017, Webster worked for Yale Law School as a senior fellow and lecturer responsible for the Paul Tsai China Center’s Track II dialogues between the United States and China and co-taught seminars on contemporary China and Chinese law and policy. While there, he was an affiliated fellow with the Yale Information Society Project, a visiting scholar at China Foreign Affairs University, and a Transatlantic Digital Debates fellow with New America and the Global Public Policy Institute in Berlin. He was previously an adjunct instructor teaching East Asian politics at New York University and a Beijing-based journalist writing on the Internet in China for CNET News.
Webster holds a bachelor's in journalism and international studies from Northwestern University and a master's in East Asian studies from Harvard University. He took doctoral coursework in political science at the University of Washington and language training at Tsinghua University, Peking University, Stanford University, and Kanda University of International Studies.
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