This page is about an institution, not an individual. Joi Ito resigned and has apologised; his own file is separate. What follows is the record of how a research laboratory inside one of the world’s leading universities built a working procedure for accepting money from a registered sex offender — and how many people had to know for that procedure to function.
Why the Media Lab is the clearest institutional case in this archive.
Harvard took more money — $9.1 million against roughly $800,000 here. But Harvard’s failure was a barred donor whose money kept arriving under other names. The Media Lab’s failure was a documented internal process for making that happen.
The emails are what distinguish it. Because a development associate kept them and gave them to a journalist, this is one of the few places where the mechanics are visible rather than inferred.
The line that carries the most weight was written by an MIT officer outside the lab. Told a gift had come in directly, he wrote: “We are not taking gifts from him.” He did not ask for it to be returned. He asked why it had not come the usual way — “What happened to the Leon Black route?”
That is not a rule being broken. It is a rule being administered.
One correction the reporting deserves. “Disqualified” in MIT’s database did not automatically mean banned — Swenson has said it usually flagged someone considered unlikely to give. The concealment is damning on its own terms and does not need the stronger version.
And the scale is larger than the direct gifts suggest. Per Farrow, Epstein arranged at least $7.5 million — $2 million from Gates and $5.5 million from Black — against the roughly $800,000 he gave himself. His value to the lab was never his own money. It was his access to other people’s.
$525,000 — what Ito initially said the lab received.
~$800,000 — what MIT disclosed across twenty years.
$7.5 million — what Farrow reported Epstein arranged, including $2m from Gates and $5.5m from Black.
Each figure was accurate. Each was also, on its own, misleading — which is what made the sequence of disclosures so damaging.
The full MIT timeline →
Section 01
The Procedure
Four steps, all documented in emails obtained by a whistleblower. None of them required anyone to lie outright — which is precisely why they worked for years.
Small donations logged as anonymous so his name never entered the record. “Jeffrey money, needs to be anonymous.”
Big gifts arrive under other names. “What happened to the Leon Black route?” — written by an MIT officer who had just said the institute was not taking his gifts.
Black flagged “do not contact, do not solicit” internally, so no unwitting fundraiser would approach him and treat the money as ordinary philanthropy.
Staff scheduling his meetings called him “Voldemort.” A codename is not carelessness — it is a system that already knows what it is doing.
Section 02
The Record
Epstein gives to MIT across two decades. MIT’s own later figure for direct gifts is approximately $800,000 over twenty years.
Ito later says he met Epstein “in 2013 at a conference through a trusted business friend.” Epstein had pleaded guilty five years earlier and was a Level 3 registered sex offender — the highest risk classification.
Signe Swenson, interviewing for a development role, finds a link to an article about Epstein’s 2008 conviction in his donor file. She tells development director Peter Cohen that MIT lists Epstein as “disqualified.” Cohen replies that Ito has a relationship with him.
On a $100,000 donation, Ito instructs development staff to “make sure this gets accounted for as anonymous.” Cohen writes in a follow-up: “Jeffrey money, needs to be anonymous.” Ito elsewhere: “we can take small gifts anonymously.”
An MIT central development officer writes to Cohen: “We are not taking gifts from him.” He does not suggest returning the money. He asks why it had not arrived less directly — “What happened to the Leon Black route?” Cohen replies that $50,000 was too little to bother Black with, and that “Jeffrey has an account that is supposed to allow him to make small gifts anonymously.”
Per Farrow, Epstein arranges at least $7.5 million in donations to the lab — including $2 million from Bill Gates and $5.5 million from Leon Black. Black is separately designated “do not contact, do not solicit” inside MIT development — ensuring no fundraiser unaware of the Epstein connection would approach him and take the gift at face value.
The effort to conceal the relationship is so widely understood that staff in Ito’s office refer to Epstein as “Voldemort” or “he who must not be named.”
Swenson leaves. She later tells Farrow that Epstein attended a meeting with lab leadership accompanied by two young women, and that she and other staff were fearful for the women’s safety.
Ito posts an open letter calling the funding an “error in judgment,” and says the lab received $525,000. Reif discloses roughly $800,000 across twenty years. Ethan Zuckerman, director of the Center for Civic Media, resigns: “It’s hard to do that work with a straight face in a place that violated its own values so clearly.” Visiting scholar J. Nathan Matias also cuts ties.
The New Yorker publishes “How an Élite University Research Center Concealed Its Relationship with Jeffrey Epstein.” Swenson, represented by Whistleblower Aid, had supplied the emails.
Hours after publication. He also leaves the boards of the MacArthur Foundation and the Knight Foundation. MacArthur: the reported behaviour, if true, “would not be in keeping with the values of MacArthur.”
At a lab meeting, founder Nicholas Negroponte says he told Ito to take the money — and would do it again. Ito emails him in the middle of the night to say he is undercutting any ability to make amends.
Reif tells the MIT community that senior administration were aware of the Epstein donations and agreed they should be accepted anonymously. Peter Cohen, by then at Brown, is suspended; Brown states the practices were “authorized by and implemented with the full knowledge of MIT central administration.”
Section 03
The Person Who Stopped It
Nothing in this file surfaced because an institution examined itself.
Signe Swenson was a development associate and alumni coordinator — in her mid-twenties, junior, and among the least powerful people who knew. She joined in 2014, found the conviction in his donor file, raised it with her director, and was told the director of the lab had a relationship with him.
She resigned in 2016. The reason she later gave is the part that should not be summarised away: Epstein attended a meeting with lab leadership accompanied by two young women, and she and other staff were afraid for the women’s safety.
She kept the emails. Three years later, working with Whistleblower Aid, she gave them to Ronan Farrow.
The lab director resigned within hours of publication. So did his positions at the MacArthur and Knight Foundations.
Every institutional consequence in this file traces back to one junior employee who kept her own records and waited three years.
This archive documents that pattern repeatedly. Giuffre’s litigation produced the sealed record. A junior fundraiser produced the MIT emails. No regulator, board or compliance process has generated a single significant disclosure in this entire story.
And the institutional response is the coda. Negroponte told a staff meeting he had advised taking the money and would do it again. Reif confirmed senior administration had known and had agreed the gifts should be anonymous. Brown University, suspending Peter Cohen, said the practices had been “authorized by and implemented with the full knowledge of MIT central administration.”
Section 04
Open Questions
Section 05
Sources
How an Élite University Research Center Concealed Its Relationship
Sept 2019. Ronan Farrow’s reporting — the “Voldemort” codename, the $7.5m arranged, and the Swenson emails.
newyorker.com →“What Happened to the Leon Black Route?”
The central-development emails, and Black’s “do not contact, do not solicit” designation inside MIT.
axios.com →What “Disqualified” Actually Meant
Sept 2019. Swenson’s clarification that the designation flagged unlikely donors, not banned ones.
technologyreview.com →The Whistleblower
Swenson on the donor file, the conviction link, and why she came forward.
npr.org →“This Should Not Be Happening”
Sept 2019. Cohen’s suspension by Brown, and Brown’s statement that MIT central administration authorised the practices.
pressreader.com →Marvin Minsky
The first MIT grant, the jail visits, the 2011 boat manifest — and an allegation he never answered.
Read the profile →Reid Hoffman
The Baume dinner, the Thiel recommendation, and the timeline he corrected himself.
Read the profile →Joi Ito
The director’s own file — the personal investments, Zimbabwe, and how it broke.
Read the profile →The MIT Timeline
The money and the science, side by side, across two decades.
Read the report →Harvard
The comparison case — a barred donor whose money kept arriving.
Read the report →