Fake News, Disinformation & Growing Need for Media Literacy

While living in Luxembourg I have become more present online, as reporting on what is happening also comes together with following the news on the internet.

Taking a look at some comments and overall profile stats of several news-related profiles, I have noticed a very different online reality.

I recalled how once someone I have known, almost 30 years old, with full enthusiasm told me about some of the most popular news circulating all over the internet, which, on my side, had barely appeared at all.

It turns out that we have our own personalised algorithms working behind the scenes via social media, etc, to deliver/present news stories is still not common knowledge for some.

While the traditional newspapers still remain the main (trusted) source of news, whether printed or online, and each individual having their own personal favourite(s), many use social media either as a primary or secondary source for news, with links to news organisations, etc.

News on social media

The initial purposes of social media apps have expanded broadly. According to the Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2026, across 48 markets, 54% of respondents now use social media and video networks as a source of news, compared with 51% who use news organisations' own websites and apps.

Just a minute of scrolling can show a friend's photo, an advertisement, the latest news footage and AI-generated media not easily judged at a glance.

Identifying the source

With roughly half of news consumers using social and video platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, TikTok and YouTube to stay informed, professional (news) media have naturally adapted too, reaching their audiences in another form.

There is nothing necessarily wrong with that. But while digesting all this information, it is easy to get fed by the wrong source, partly by not understanding that your social media activity has tracked your preferences and is therefore filtering news to present to you to consume.

Influencers have become authorities to some, while anonymous profiles carry words such as "News", "TV" or "Radio" in their names. Professional journalism, on the other hand, should come with identifiable authorship, sourcing, editorial responsibility, corrections and accountability.

Instead of separating social media and news into black and white, it remains a very grey area. This means the person themself, consuming the information, should be aware of where it is coming from. Possibly looking for a verified-account icon and genuine followers (not fake accounts) or considering the activity history. It is about trusting sources.

Disinformation and manipulation

The fake accounts, which use misinformation (false, inaccurate or misleading) and disinformation (deliberately spread to deceive or gain advantage) can become particularly difficult to spot when they borrow the identity of already known sources.

Ahead of Sweden's parliamentary election this September, the already established Russian-linked disinformation campaign "Matryoshka" (Russian doll) again circulated fabricated content imitating some well-known European media.

Disinformation can also operate on a much larger scale than an anonymous-looking profile. The EU refers to Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference (FIMI) when such activity involves coordinated foreign interference in the information environment.

Such campaigns can push particular narratives, create confusion, deepen divisions or weaken trust in institutions. The European External Action Service has documented Russia-linked operations involving state-controlled media, social media channels, private companies and local proxies amplifying the same narratives.

The issue has gone beyond fact-checking individual stories. The EU has suspended the broadcasting activities and licences of 27 Kremlin-backed outlets, including RT and Sputnik, over their role in Russian propaganda and disinformation.

This also makes knowing who stands behind a media outlet relevant. Ownership, funding and editorial control play a crucial role.

AI-generated media brings another issue. Deepfakes can make a person appear to say or do something they never did, using artificially generated or manipulated images, audio or video.

Fortunately, since August 2026, the EU AI Act has required deepfakes covered by its rules to be disclosed as artificially generated or manipulated.

Fake online popularity

As I already mentioned above, some people, seeing the same content or accounts repeatedly can easily create the impression that everyone else is seeing it too.

A large number of followers and likes can strengthen that impression even further, creating a false impression of popularity. The University of Luxembourg's FAMOUS project (2024) identified more than 2,000 websites, which were selling fake accounts, followers, reviews and likes in Europe, showing just how easily online popularity can be bought.

Misleading footage

With such easy access to digital tools, anyone who witnesses is able to capture an accident, protest or disaster, and "report" on their perspective of what happened, possibly without knowing or understanding the background or context. That footage can spread to thousands or millions of people within just minutes. 

The same content can later be taken by another account and, misleadingly, attributed to a completely different event. This is where tools such as "reverse-image search" become useful. Instead of only asking whether an image looks real, they can help trace where it appeared before and whether it actually belongs to the story attached to it.

Media literacy in education

Just over a decade ago, I remember learning programmes such as Excel and Word and the basics of coding on an old-school computer. In high school, this was largely what our computer science education looked like. Today, technical digital skills should be complemented by a teaching of media literacy and financial literacy too, but that is for a separate article...

The warning of being careful trusting any internet source has been around for years, but fake news still finds its audiences. The question is whether media education can keep pace with how quickly online content spreads.

Globally, there is still a gap. UNESCO's mapping across 194 Member States found that only 43% had incorporated media and information literacy into formal education, while another 29% focused mainly on technical digital skills.

Luxembourg has already moved further in this direction through Medienkompass, which approaches media competence across different subjects and has been updated to include areas such as AI and data literacy.

Information overload

On top of knowing how to differentiate true from false information, the approach to consuming it should also be reconsidered. Just because there is access to almost anything does not mean that all of it needs to be taken in.

Sure, it is important to know what is going on in the world, but digging too deep into horrific content or eyewitness reports can drain a lot of energy unnecessarily, especially when there is nothing one can do about it.

News should not really be treated as a substitute for entertainment either. It is normal for bad news to cause fear, anger or sadness, but there is a difference between reporting on something emotional and deliberately trying to trigger those emotions further.

An unnecessarily "loud" headline, designed more to shock than inform, is already a reason to look twice at who is publishing it and why.