News Room

A collection of press releases, audio content and media clips featuring INFORMS members and their research.

Unmasking Human Trafficking: New AI Research Reveals Hidden Recruitment Networks
News Release

BALTIMORE, MD, May 24, 2025 – Most anti-human trafficking efforts focus on breaking up sex sales; however, new research in the INFORMS journal Manufacturing & Service Operations Management is turning its attention to where trafficking truly begins – recruitment. Using machine learning to analyze millions of online ads, researchers at the University of Pennsylvania have uncovered patterns that link deceptive job offers to sex trafficking networks. By mapping the connections between recruitment and sales locations, the study reveals a hidden supply chain – one that can now be exposed and interrupted earlier in the trafficking process.

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Why Congress May Push Back on State AI Regulations
Media Coverage

House Republicans proposed a 10-year pause on state rules for artificial intelligence. What that could mean for consumer protections.

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Has flying become more dangerous? We speak to a Professor of statistics and a Director of aerospace engineering
Media Coverage

From the Jeju Airline tragedy to the Washington DC plane and helicopter collision, it makes you wonder whether flight safety standards have dropped.

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Resoundingly Human Podcast

An audio journey of how data and analytics save lives, save money and solve problems.

Media Contact

Jeff Cohen
Chief Strategy Officer
INFORMS
Catonsville, MD
[email protected]
443-757-3565

INFORMS in the News

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The benefits of working outside your field

Harvard Business Review, October 31, 2016

After dedicating a significant number of years and money to earning a university degree, what motivates people to voluntarily work in jobs outside their field? In a study selected for publication in the INFORMS journal Organization Science, study author Briana Sell Stenard, INFORMS member and assistant professor of management and entrepreneurship at the Stetson School of Business and Economics at Mercer University, explored the factors that contribute to this including loss of interest, better pay and working conditions, higher positions, and increased flexibility.

Measuring the cool factor

Changing Business, Johns Hopkins Carey Business School, September 16, 2016

In an upcoming Management Science study, INFORMS member and professor at the Johns Hopkins Carey Business School Ruxian Wang has developed a method to measure the appeal or "cool factor" of commercial products.

Reducing the chronic illness costs

Changing Business, Johns Hopkins Carey Business School, September 16, 2016

A forthcoming study in the INFORMS journal Marketing Science by INFORMS member and professor at Johns Hopkins Carey Business School, Jian Ni, explores how guiding patients to a more appropriate level of healthcare can reduce healthcare expenditures. 

The pub crawl of a lifetime

The Guardian, October 21, 2016

Planning a pub crawl and need to know the shortest distance between each of your stops? INFORMS member Professor William Cook from the University of Waterloo, Canada has done just that on a much grander scale than could be accomplished in one night of festivities. Using the "traveling salesman problem" approach, Cook plotted the coordinates of 24,727 pubs in the U.K. to ascertain the shortest possible route between them all.

An OR career means high pay with low stress

Independent, October 19, 2016

Based on data pulled from the Occupational Information Network (O*NET), a US Department of Labor database that compiles detailed information on hundreds of jobs, and the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics website, operations research analysts are among a list of 26 jobs that combine high pay with low stress.

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OR/MS Today is the INFORMS member magazine that shares the latest research and best practices in operations research, analytics and the management sciences.

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