Artificial intelligence and digital forensics expert Hany Farid has been named the winner of the 2025 .
Farid served for two decades on Dartmouth’s faculty, where he pioneered the field of digital forensics. His innovations—including PhotoDNA, a technology deployed globally to identify and remove child exploitation imagery, and advanced deepfake detection technologies—have become essential tools for law enforcement, human rights advocates, and major tech companies including Microsoft and Google.
The $100,000 prize, established through a gift from , and , recognizes Dartmouth students, faculty, staff, alumni, or friends who are making a significant positive impact on humanity, society, or the environment.
“Hany Farid’s work exemplifies the very essence of the McGuire Prize, and carries forward Dartmouth’s leadership as the birthplace of artificial intelligence nearly 70 years ago,” says. “He has combined scientific rigor with an unwavering commitment to societal good, creating technologies that protect the vulnerable and preserve truth in an era of unprecedented digital complexity.”
Each year, the recipient is invited to campus to receive the prize and engage the Dartmouth community in discussions of their work. Farid will return to Dartmouth on Feb. 27-28 and looks forward to taking part in lectures and classroom discussions.
“I’m delighted to return to campus, and receiving anything with Terry’s name on it is really quite special,” says Farid. “For me, it’s not so much the award, but the recognition that my work is having an impact on the world around us.”
Farid serves as a professor at the University of California, Berkeley, with a joint appointment in electrical engineering, computer sciences, and the School of Information. His research focuses on digital forensics, forensic science, misinformation, image analysis, and human perception.
Farid previously spent 20 years as a Dartmouth faculty member in the , beginning in 1999. His scholarship was recognized with an Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship in 2002 and a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2006, and in 2016 he was named a fellow of the National Academy of Inventors, the same year he authored the first comprehensive guide to authenticating digital images with his book .
Farid became interested in the puzzle of detecting digitally manipulated photos around the time he joined Dartmouth, when the internet was still young and most image manipulation relied on manual tools like Photoshop.
“The field has grown from my grad students and me messing around in Photoshop to a full-blown academic field, and now we’re moving to the next stage of making these tools available to people who need them,” he says.
In 2024, Farid co-founded GetReal Security, a company specializing in the authentication of digital media, including AI-generated images, videos, and audio.
“AI-generated slop is polluting our information ecosystem, and it’s getting harder to tell what is real and what is not,” Farid says. “We develop mathematical and computational technologies that can ingest a piece of content and then help us determine if it’s AI-generated or manipulated or not.”
A sought-after AI expert, he has recently discussed deepfake detection on PBS’s and delivered a , among other public engagements.
Farid’s multidisciplinary background helped set the stage for his groundbreaking work. Born to Egyptian parents in Germany, he spent most of his childhood in Rochester, N.Y. After a stint as a computer programmer, he earned his undergraduate degree in applied mathematics from the University of Rochester before completing an MS in computer science at the State University of New York at Albany and a PhD in computer science at the University of Pennsylvania. Before joining Dartmouth in 1999, Farid worked as a postdoctoral fellow in brain and cognitive sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Farid credits Dartmouth for hiring him even though he wasn’t “a cookie-cutter computer scientist.”
“Dartmouth is an amazing place—it’s really nurturing to its undergraduates, graduate students, and faculty,” he says. “I don’t think I would have been able to do what I’ve done if I’d started my career somewhere else. I will always be grateful that the College was so open-minded and let me explore brand new ideas as a young scientist.”
Farid says his career has been shaped by a willingness to say yes when unexpected opportunities come his way.
“When I talk with students these days, they’re so overwhelmed by the scale of the problem—climate change, hate, threats to democracy—that they think they can’t do anything. But I tell them, no, you can. You have to just do it.”
Previous recipients of the McGuire Family Prize are, a former Geisel School of Medicine professor whose groundbreaking coronavirus research laid the foundation for COVID-19 vaccine development, and Rose Mutiso ’08, Thayer ’08, who was recognized for her work at the intersections of science, policy, gender equity, and international development.
“The McGuires’ generosity helps us honor those who follow the Dartmouth tradition of approaching new technologies with critical thinking and humanity—essential qualities for future leaders and a core benefit of a liberal arts education,” says President Beilock.
This year’s selection committee was chaired by, vice provost for research and a professor of biochemistry and cell biology. The committee included, a professor of engineering;, a partner and founder of New Energy Capital;, the Charles Henry Jones Third Century Professor of Management;, a professor of computer science; and, a professor of medicine and chair of radiation oncology and applied sciences.
