Digital resilience

The EU has begun to address the very serious problem of online disinformation campaigns. However, the extent of the problem is vast and will require a concerted effort to maintain free elections on the continent.

Takeaways

• The limitations on fact-checking can be erased with emerging technologies.
• The fate of European democracy could be in the hands of bots and trolls.
• Tools for fighting disinformation online already exist and need to be used more readily.

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Electoral Climate Change

Compared to 2014, this year’s European elections will be held in a very different political and legal environment. Europeans need to assume a particular responsibility in the area of defending democratic procedures against foreign interference and illegal manipulation.

The European Commission has prepared a set of measures to protect free and fair European election. Moreover, the December 2018 report added an action plan based on the following four pillars:

• improving the effectiveness of Union institutions in detecting and analysing fake news
• introducing a rapid alert system to expedite coordinated responses to disinformation
• engaging with online platform companies to tackle disinformation
• establishing multidisciplinary expert teams and holding seminars, conferences and public debates, etc., in order to raise the digital literacy of members of the media and the general public

Free and fair elections are the cornerstone of the European democratic system, which is why ensuring protection against disinformation is one of our key tasks.

V4 response

In Czechia, a Centre Against Terrorism and Hybrid Threats has been established as part of the Ministry of the Interior, whose specialised employees will train civil servants.

In Poland, the Ministry of Digitisation is considering the implementation of technical solutions to combat disinformation, but as yet, there has been no announcement of establishing a specific institution.

The ministry wishes to rely mainly on the so-called soft measures such as education, enhanced transparency of the content’s origin and sources of funding though they are to offer support for self-regulatory measures, e.g. by online platforms, news distributors or journalist and writing communities promoting reliable and high-quality sources of information.

In many countries, private companies and NGOs such as foundations and think tanks are involved in combating disinformation. And here is a set of online tools to help you defend yourself from the effects of disinformation.

Top Ten 

Here is a list of ten best tools and organisations committed to the fight against digitally amplified disinformation:

Catch and Kill

ABT SHIELD – A humble self-promotion, well-deserved. ABT Shield developed a functional, commercially available service enabling every publisher and social medium to quickly identify sources of disinformation, trolling and bot traffic. The unique component of ABT Shield is that it singles out machines rather than users, the first of its kind.  

Fact-checking and Verification

AFP Fact Check  – carried out by fact-checking editors and a worldwide network of journalists, following the editorial standards and key guiding principles of the AFP global news agency. They share tips and tools to help others carry out fact-checking and verification.

Worldwide Consortium  

Atlantic Council – DRFLab – Digital Forensic Research Lab. Catalysing a global network of digital forensic researchers, following conflicts in real time.

The Spin-free Zone

BBC Reality Check – here the emphasis is on cutting through the spin and concentrating on the facts.

A Review of Disinformation

EU vs DISinfo – This website is part of a campaign to better forecast, address and respond to pro-Kremlin disinformation

Exposing Authoritarianism

GMF – Alliance for Securing Democracy (ASD) – a bipartisan, transatlantic initiative housed at The German Marshall Fund of the United States (GMF), develops comprehensive strategies to defend against, deter and raise the costs of Russian and other state actors’ efforts to undermine democracy and democratic institutions. The Alliance works to publicly document and expose the ongoing efforts by Vladimir Putin and other authoritarian regimes to subvert democracy in the United States, in Europe, and globally.

Swiping left on Disinfo

Le Monde Decodex   – is a tool that helps check news circulating on the web and searches for falsities, manipulated and distorted news.

Crushing the Kremlin

StopFake – a fact-checking website. The main goal of this community was to monitor the media to check and debunk distorted news and propaganda related to the developments in Ukraine. After some time, the project became a news service, where all forms of Kremlin propaganda are subject to in-depth scrutiny.

Solutions based Journalism

Truly Media – is a unique web-based collaboration platform. It has been designed to support the verification of digital (user-generated) content residing in social networks and elsewhere. Truly Media was developed in very close collaboration with journalists and human rights investigators, taking their demands and requirements fully into account.

Collaborating Platform

University of Oxford – Computational Propaganda – investigating the use of algorithms, automation, and computational propaganda in public life, studying both the bot scripts and the people making such bots, and then work with computer scientists to improve the ways we catch and stop the bot activity.

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About:
Visegrad Insight 2 (14) 2019
European Parliamentary #Futures
Download the report 

Published by Res Publica Foundation
Partner: Konrad Adenauer Foundation
Supported by: ABTSHIELD

Authors:
Wojciech Przybylski, Editor-in-Chief
Marcin Zaborowski, Senior Associate

Team:
Magda Jakubowska, Director of Operations
Galan Dall, Managing Editor
Anhelina Pryimak, Editorial Assistant
Anna Kulikowska-Kasper, Contributor
Paweł Kuczyński, Illustrations
Rzeczyobrazkowe, Graphic Design