Citizens can defeat disinformation - Lisbon 2025

This conference in Lisbon is the fourth event on disinformation being hosted by the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC) as part of its ongoing project aiming to fight disinformation with the help of civil society.

Using new technologies for its own profit, disinformation has become a serious societal problem, with a negative impact on the quality of democracy and public debate. With the massive deployment of artificial intelligence, the question is increasingly perceived by national and European institutions, public opinion, the media sector and economic players as being one of our main challenges for the future.

Since disinformation tends to spread horizontally, the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC) considers it crucial to engage the public directly in discussions and thinking on the matter. For this reason, we are organising events and information campaigns together with local partners in various countries.

A new conference in the series entitled "CITIZENS CAN DEFEAT DISINFORMATION. Civil society for an open democratic debate" will be held in Lisbon on 22 May, in cooperation with the Economic and Social Council of Portugal.

The conference will bring together representatives from the Portuguese authorities, EU institutions and civil society organisations, as well as journalists, social media experts and influencers, academics, students and individual citizens interested in the topic.

The event is open to the public and will be web-streamed in Portuguese and English.