A key initiative to strengthen the fight against disinformation

Editorial/David Viera

This event was aimed at teachers, researchers and journalists, showing innovative tools to combat social polarization and the spread of fake news. The event was attended by journalists, 'fact checkers' from different media such as VerificaRTVE or the Maldita.es Foundation, and academics from all the universities in the Community of Madrid.

Among the results of the project, the "Handbook on Identifying and Countering Disinformation" was presented, a comprehensive training program, as well as the in-person training activities that have been carried out in three editions in Spain, Malta and Romania, with the participation of 90 attendees , including 30 teachers and students from the Rey Juan Carlos University.

In addition, other significant achievements of the project were highlighted, such as the creation of 70 Open Educational Resources (OER) available in Classroom cyberimaginary and in open knowledge platforms such as Zenodo, Epale and Digital Skills & Jobs Platform, and the MOOC DOMINOES, an open and free 25-hour course, available from November 2023 on the platform URJCx, and in which more than 550 students of various nationalities have already been trained. The project also includes numerous interviews with experts, journalists, fact-checkers and researchers on disinformation who offer perspectives and practical solutions to this growing social problem.

Attendees participated in different interactive activities such as the game "Fight between information and misinformation. Who will win?" or the detection of deepfakes in virtual environments, which tested their abilities to identify and combat disinformation.

The session ended with the delivery to the attendees of the innovative DOMINOES pack to combat misinformation, and the invitation of the project coordinators, professors Manuel Gértrudix and Rubén Arcos, from the Ciberimaginario research group, for the attendees to contribute to the dissemination and use of all the materials and resources developed that, thanks to being available under open licenses, can be reused freely, a key commitment of the Rey Juan Carlos University with open knowledge.