Building societal resilience against disinformation

Overview

In today's complex digital and media landscape, it is crucial that citizens are aware of the risks of disinformation and are well-equipped to identify false or misleading information and stop it from spreading.

The European Union is committed to ensuring that our societies remain resilient in the face of these emerging challenges.

To achieve this, the European Commission has developed a range of tools and initiatives designed to promote critical thinking and empower individuals and communities to recognise, resist, and respond to disinformation effectively.

Raising awareness of disinformation

Awareness-raising is key to the EU's approach for highlighting false or misleading information and the methods used to spread it online.

To help citizens recognise disinformation and understand the risks of spreading it further, the Commission has been working alongside its partners to reach a wide audience via different communication channels.

Awareness-raising ahead of the 2024 EU elections

For example, ahead of the 2024 European elections, the Commission, together with the European Regulators Group for Audiovisual Media Services (ERGA), launched a joint video campaign.

The campaign aimed to provide citizens with practical advice on how to think critically to spot and avoid sharing deceptive content online.

The video campaign ran across social media, TV and radio stations in all 27 Member States and was available in all 24 official EU languages.

Providing tips to protect citizens from disinformation

The Commission, together with its partners, has also made available some additional tips and resources to help citizens avoid falling for disinformation and unintentionally spreading it.

How to recognise disinformation

Tips on how to spot a deceptive news story and identify authentic sources instead.

How to recognise deepfakes

Tips on how to identify manipulated audio and videos and verify official sources.

How to resist manipulation

Tips on how to avoid being manipulated by false information online and spreading it unintentionally.

Access other tips and resources

Increasing media literacy

Media literacy is important for building societal resilience against disinformation. The capacity to access, have a critical understanding of the media and interact with it, is crucial.

Media literacy enables citizens to navigate the modern digital news environment and make well-informed choices. It is especially important to learn how to recognise disinformation from an early age; as such, education has a crucial role in ensuring a media-literate public.

The revised Audiovisual Media Services Directive (AVMSD) seeks to ensure that Member States promote and take measures that develop media literacy skills and to report on these measures.

A teacher monitoring her students using laptops in a classroom.

Call for proposals - Cross-border media literacy projects

The Commission has launched a call for proposals to support projects that enhance the media literacy skills of Europeans, support effective cross-border cooperation, and limit the detrimental impact of disinformation.

The deadline to apply for funding is 6 March 2025.

Find out more

Media and digital literacy resources

The Commission has also made available resources to support Member States, educators and organisations to contribute to the fight against disinformation.