All tasks

Research

Using AI to find leads and starting points, never as a source you can cite.

Outcome

An answer built from sources you opened, with a visible boundary between evidence, inference, and what remains unknown.

Data gate

  • Public: public questions and sources can use web search and checked cloud assistants.
  • Internal: unpublished research plans, draft findings, and partner submissions need an approved account or a local route.
  • Identifiable: source names, case details, private links, and protected research interests stay out of consumer cloud tools and search queries.

Use AI when

  • You need search terms, candidate institutions, source comparison, or a draft evidence table.
  • You can open original sources and check consequential claims.
  • The tool can distinguish retrieved evidence from its own synthesis.

Do not use AI when

  • You need a citation without time to open it.
  • A search query would reveal a protected person, location, investigation, or private link.
  • The answer depends on current law, policy, or fast-changing facts and no current source is available.

Workflow

  1. Prepare: write the question, audience, date range, geography, exclusions, and required answer fields.
  2. Process: gather sources in a first pass, then search specifically for missing or contradictory evidence.
  3. Verify: open the original source for each material claim and record support, contradiction, uncertainty, and scope.
  4. Store: save the claim ledger, source links, access dates, and final synthesis together.

Human verification checklist

  • Every citation opens and supports the nearby claim.
  • Dates, jurisdictions, populations, and definitions match the question.
  • Important disagreement is explained, not averaged away.
  • Search absence is not presented as proof of real-world absence.

If it fails

Remove invented or inaccessible citations and search from known publishers or source titles. Narrow the claim when the evidence is narrower. If a consequential gap remains, state it instead of asking the model to fill it.

Start next

Use the tools and recipes below for the source type you have. A general assistant such as can help generate a research plan, but it is not a citable source.

Prompts for this task

  • Redact first

    Build a dated timeline from your notes

    25 minutes · Gives you a table

    Answer in [ANSWER LANGUAGE], even if the material below is in another language.
    
    Below are notes from several sources, with names and identifying details already removed. Build a timeline from them.
    
    Rules:
    1. Use only what the notes say. Infer nothing. Never calculate or guess a date.
    2. One row per event. If two notes describe the same event, merge them into one row and list both sources.
    3. If an event has no date, it goes in the undated list, not in the table.
    4. Mark each row STATED if the note gives the date, or UNCLEAR if the note is ambiguous about it.
    5. Copy each date in the form the note wrote it. Where the notes mix digits, ١٢٣ alongside 123, or write one date two ways, keep both and mark the row UNCLEAR.
    6. Name people only by the label the notes use. Never replace a label with a real name.
    
    Give me, in this order:
    A. A table with these columns: date, what happened, where, who the note names, source note, STATED or UNCLEAR.
    B. Undated events, as a list, each with its source note.
    C. Contradictions between the notes, quoted on both sides.
    D. What a reader would need next to close each contradiction.
    
    If you are reading on a phone, replace the table with one block per row: a heading line, then one short labelled line per column.
    
    Notes:
    [PASTE THE REDACTED NOTES]
    How to use it
  • Public material only

    Find out what is wrong with an answer you got

    10 minutes · Gives you short sections · Works on a phone

    Answer in [ANSWER LANGUAGE], even if the material below is in another language.
    
    Below is a prompt I used and the answer I got. I do not trust the answer. Examine it. Do not defend it, and do not rewrite it. I am not asking for a better answer. I am asking what is wrong with this one and what in my wording allowed it.
    
    Rules:
    1. Judge the answer only against what my prompt gave it. If a claim is not supported by the material or the instructions in my prompt, say so, even when the claim sounds correct.
    2. Quote the exact words of the answer you object to. Do not paraphrase them. Copy numbers as they appear, including mixed digits: ١٢٣ alongside 123.
    3. Separate two things: a claim that goes beyond what was given, and a detail that appears invented, such as a number, a date, an article number, a page reference, a name or a quotation with no source in my prompt.
    4. Add no facts of your own, and do not tell me whether the answer is true in the world. Tell me whether my prompt supports it.
    5. If nothing in the answer is unsupported, say that plainly in one line.
    
    Give me, in this order:
    A. Unsupported claims. For each: the quoted words, and one sentence saying what would have had to be in my prompt for the claim to stand.
    B. Details that appear invented. For each: the quoted detail, its type (number, date, article number, page, name, quotation), and where in my prompt it would have come from if it were real.
    C. What in my wording allowed it. Point at the exact phrase, or at the instruction that is missing, not at the tool.
    D. The two changes to my prompt. Write out each replacement line in full, ready for me to copy, and nothing else in this section.
    
    The prompt I used:
    [PASTE THE PROMPT YOU USED]
    
    The answer I got:
    [PASTE THE ANSWER YOU GOT]
    How to use it

Tools that help with this

  • Never for sensitive materialHas a free versionWorks in Iraq
  • Never for sensitive materialHas a free versionWorks in Iraq
  • Never for sensitive materialHas a free versionWorks in Iraq
  • Only approved or redacted sensitive materialHas a free versionWorks in Iraq

Step-by-step guides for this

Last checked: 2026-09-01