Alexa Koenig is co-founder and director of UC Berkeley’s pioneering Investigations Lab, a research professor at Berkeley Law, a lecturer with the Investigative Reporting Program at Berkeley Journalism, and faculty director of UC Berkeley’s MacArthur Award-Winning Human Rights Center. Alexa directed the development of the United Nations' Berkeley Protocol on Digital Open Source Investigations, which sets global standards for online investigations; has trained journalists, war crimes investigators and others around the world in online research and verification methods; and previously co-chaired the Technology Advisory Board for the Office of the Prosecutor at the International Criminal Court.

Alexa has co-authored and co-edited several books, including Hiding in Plain Sight (UC Press), Graphic: Trauma and Meaning in Our Online Lives (Cambridge Univ. Press), At an Intersection: Using Open Source Information to Investigate Sexual and Gender-Based Violence (UC Press, forthcoming 2027), and Digital Witness: Using Open Source Information for Human Rights Investigation, Documentation and Accountability (Oxford Univ. Press), which will be released in a greatly-expanded second edition in late 2026.

Alexa has been recognized as one of “100 Brilliant Women in AI Ethics;” been honored as a “Woman Inspiring Change” by Harvard Law School’s Women’s Law Association; received the Mark Bingham Award for Excellence; and shared in the Times Higher Education Award for International Collaboration, among other honors. Reporting that her team has supported has received the Pulitzer Prize, among other honors.

Alexa has a BA from UCLA, a JD from the University of San Francisco, and an MA and PhD from UC Berkeley.

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