On the 12th, December, 2019 a project team lead by Media Creativa 2020 from Spain and including Business Foundation for Education from Bulgaria, Social Cooperative Enterprise Drosostalida from Greece, Virtual Campus from Portugal and Folkouniversitetet from Sweden gathered in Porto, Portugal to launch a new Erasmus+ project called CRITICAL.
The project aims to enable young adults to recognize, identify, act and manage against the risks of online information (cyberbullying, fake news, post-truth, radicalism, online violence, etc.). They will learn to face these threats in a responsible and critical way, which will favour their security and digital well-being.
The misinformation and generalization of the so called fake news are beginning to be a serious problem, affecting all citizens and representing an attack on the foundations of a democracy. The Eurobarometer from April 2018 confirmed that more than 85% of respondents think that the existence of fake news is a problem in their country, at least to some extent, and a similar proportion (83%) say that it is a problem for democracy in general.
But, are adult Europeans able to identify and protect themselves from these risks? As a reference, only a 15% of respondants in the mentioned Eurobarometer feel very confident about being able to identify fake news; and according to the EC data, 44% of Europeans aged 16-74 do not have basic digital skills.
The team will create an online platform with training materials and scenarios to support everybody interested in online security and responsible use of information.
The CRITICAL project, 2019-1-ES01-KA204-064082, has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.