EU: Action Plan against Disinformation
European Commission, Brussels, 5.12.2018
The European Council commissioned an action plan by December 2018 with specific proposals (in strategic communication) for a coordinated response to the challenge of disinformation, with a view to the 2019 European elections.
Disinformation is understood as verifiably false or misleading information that is created, presented and disseminated for economic gain or to intentionally deceive the public, and may cause public harm.
Public harm includes threats to democratic processes as well as to public goods such as Union citizens’ health, environment or security.
Disinformation does not include inadvertent errors, satire and parody, or clearly identified partisan news and commentary.
Everybody can effectively protect himself and others from disinformation by deploying information literacy:
- Do you know the source? If so, is it reliable? (Trolls, Bots)
- How do you judge the medium? (video manipulations, fake social media profiles, etc.)
- Can you verify the content? What do fact checkers say? (e.g. Mimikama)
- Can you justify your behaviour on social media (like, share) as it contributes to the spread of information?
- Are you familiar with the nature of conspiracy theories, denialism, etc.?
- What does your common sense tell you? How plausible is a message?
To increase public awareness and resilience, the Commission will further step up its commitment and current activities in relation to media literacy to empower Union citizens to better identify and deal with disinformation. […] This requires continuous and sustained efforts to support education and media literacy, journalism, fact-checkers, researchers, and the civil society as a whole.
Further reading:
East StratCom Task Force of the European External Action Service
The EU steps up action against disinformation (Press release of 5 December 2018)
Tackling Online Disinformation (by IICIIS)
More links to the topic “disinformation” on
http://www.pearltrees.com/iiciis/disinformation/id17884573