1. INTRODUCTION
Freedom of expression is a core value of the European Union enshrined in the European Union Charter of Fundamental Rights and in the constitutions of Member States. Our open democratic societies depend on the ability of citizens to access a variety of verifiable information so that they can form a view on different political issues. In this way, citizens can participate in an informed way in public debates and express their will through free and fair political processes. These democratic processes are increasingly challenged by deliberate, large-scale, and systematic spreading of disinformation.
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[1]. 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. The actions contained in this Action Plan only target disinformation content that is legal under Union or national law. They are without prejudice to the laws of the Union or of any of the Member States that may be applicable, including rules on illegal content[2].
Following the Salisbury chemical attack and the related European Council conclusions[3], the Commission and the High Representative presented a Joint Communication on bolstering resilience against hybrid threats[4] that highlighted strategic communication as a priority field for further work. The European Council, then, invited the "High Representative and the Commission to present, in cooperation with the Member States and in line with the March 2015 European Council conclusions, an action plan by December 2018 with specific proposals for a coordinated response to the challenge of disinformation, including appropriate mandates and sufficient resources for the relevant EEAS Strategic Communications teams"[5].
This Action Plan answers the European Council’s call for measures to “protect the Union’s democratic systems and combat disinformation, including in the context of the upcoming European elections”[6]. It builds on existing Commission initiatives and the work of the East Strategic Communication Task Force of the European External Action Service. It sets out actions to be taken by the Commission and the High Representative, with the assistance of the European External Action Service, in cooperation with Member States and the European Parliament. This Plan includes input received from Member States, including via discussions at Council [7], in Permanent Representatives Committees I and II, the Political Security Committee, relevant Council working parties and meetings of strategic communication and political directors of Ministries of Foreign Affairs. It also takes into account the cooperation
- ↑ Communication on tackling on-line disinformation, COM(2018) 236
- ↑ The Commission proposed targeted measures to address the spread of illegal content on-line, including the Recommendation on measures to effectively tackle illegal content online (C(2018) 1177). See also proposal for a Regulation on preventing the dissemination of terrorist content online COM(2018) 640 as well as the revised Audiovisual Media Services Directive agreed on 6 November 2018
- ↑ European Council conclusions, 22 March 2018.
- ↑ JOIN(2018) 16.
- ↑ European Council conclusions, 28 June 2018.
- ↑ European Council conclusions, 18 October 2018.
- ↑ See policy debate on “Tackling the spread of disinformation online: Challenges for the media ecosystem” and Council conclusions of 27 November 2018.
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