Under the name IBERIFIER, 23 Spanish and Portuguese institutions will create an observatory to research digital media and monitor disinformation threats. This project is one of the eight regional hubs that will form part of the European Commission’s European Digital Media Observatory. It has funding of €1.47 million over two and a half years to cover the activities of the project, which brings together 12 universities, 5 fact-checking organisations and news agencies, and 6 multidisciplinary research institutions to study disinformation in Spain and Portugal.
Maldita.es has been a driving force behind this project from the outset and it aligns with our support for research into disinformation. It represents a further step in our commitment to studying a phenomenon that affects us all and for which it is necessary to generate scientific evidence through academic research in order to combat disinformation.
The observatory will focus its research on five lines of work. First, it will investigate the characteristics and trends of the Iberian digital media ecosystem. It will also develop computational technologies for the early detection of disinformation. In addition, it will fact-check and debunk disinformation in the Iberian territory, creating a shared platform to host these debunks. It will also prepare strategic reports on disinformation threats, both for public awareness and for authorities in Spain and Portugal, always maintaining its independence. Finally, it will also work on media literacy initiatives aimed at journalists and information professionals, young people and society as a whole.
IBERIFIER is made up of:
Fact-checkers and news agencies
- Maldita.es
- EFE Verifica
- Verificat
- Polígrafo
- Lusa – Agência de Notícias de Portugal
Universities
- University of Navarra (Project Coordinator)
- Instituto Universitário de Lisboa – ISCTE
- University of Granada
- Carlos III University of Madrid
- University of Santiago de Compostela
- Polytechnic University of Valencia
- Polytechnic University of Madrid
- Miguel Hernández University of Elche
- University of Valencia – Estudi General
- University of Aveiro
- San Pablo CEU University Foundation
- Rey Juan Carlos University
Other research centres
- Elcano Royal Institute
- FECYT
- Barcelona Supercomputing Center – National Supercomputing Center
- Centro Protocolar de Formação Profissional para Jornalistas – Cenjor
- OberCom – Observatório da Comunicação
- Associação Literacia Para os Media e Jornalismo
IBERIFIER is one of the eight digital media and disinformation observatories recently approved by the European Commission. The other seven are the Ireland Hub, led by Dublin City University (Ireland); EDMO BE/NL, led by Stichting Nederlands Institute voor Beeld en Geluid (the Netherlands); the Central European Digital Media Observatory (CEDMO), led by Charles University (Czech Republic); NORDIS – Nordic Observatory for Digital Media and Information Disorders, led by Aarhus University (Denmark); the Belgium-Luxembourg Research Hub on Digital Media and Disinformation (EDMO BELUCOX), led by Vrije Universiteit Brussel (Belgium); the DE FACTO Observatory of Information, led by the Fondation Nationale des Sciences Politiques (France); and the Italian Digital Media Observatory, led by LUISS Guido Carli University (Italy).