US News and World Report covers in details the Media Literacy Index of OSI-Sofia in its article “Finland Most Resistant to ‘Fake News,’ Report Finds”, published on 27 January 2023. The article says that “Nordic countries fare well in an analysis of countries resistant to fake news, while Georgia performed the worst” and that “The United States and much of Western Europe – including the United Kingdom, France and Germany – ranked in a lower tier with countries such as Latvia and Lithuania in an expanded version of the analysis, which measures countries’ susceptibility to false news reports.”
The article quotes Marin Lessenski, author of the report, saying that ““It is worrying that the societies which are most vulnerable to the impact of fake news are at the same time the least concerned about the spreading and the impact of disinformation,” … “This increases the risks related to disinformation in such countries, especially in the context of the war in Ukraine, as part of the public does not realize or just ignores its vulnerability.””
US News and World Report article also emphasizes that the ““dangers of fake news and related phenomena for democracy are hard to underestimate.” The countries where media literacy is at its lowest have the greatest restrictions on press freedom and low levels of education and personal trust.””
The Media Literacy Index of the Open Society Institute – Sofia, published since 2017, assesses the resilience potential to fake news in 41 European countries, using indicators for media freedom, education and trust in people. The full text of the latest report of the Media Literacy Index 2022 “How It Started, How It is Going” can be found here https://osis.bg/?p=4243&lang=en
The US News and World Report article “Finland Most Resistant to ‘Fake News,’ Report Finds”, by Madeline Fitzgerald, published on 27 January 2023.
