Author: Claudia Schäfer, freelance journalist, trainer and online hate speech expert
Reviewer: Christo Buschek, Der SPIEGEL / Paper Trail Media
Introduction
Traditional media consumption as well as trust in news have continuously dropped in Austria in the past decade. The loss of audiences and revenue due to digital rivals, led to lay-offs, restructuring and even the closure of media outlets. The long-established and ongoing system of public subsidies for media along with the public sector’s generous advertising spending does not only play an important role in the viability of some news organisations but also raise concerns about their impartiality.
With the internet becoming the prime place for news sourcing, the spread of (intentional) false content has also accelerated. This became particularly evident during the pandemic, when content questioning the effectiveness of the vaccines as well as the governmental measures led to the emergence of a critical movement from across society.
Nowadays, mis- and disinformation as well as manipulative content on almost any topic of societal relevance can be found online, in social media feeds and messenger groups, on (news) websites, blogs, traditional and alternative media, and often the initial creator or source of its components can hardly be identified.
Get the full overview of Austria’s disinformation landscape – click below to read more.
We have more European country factsheets. Curious to discover the others? Click here.
The initial project (V1 of this factsheet) was funded by the Friedrich Naumann Foundation. Further updates have been funded on EU DisinfoLab’s own resources. If you’re interested in supporting our efforts, get in touch.
The opinions expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the position of EU DisinfoLab. This factsheet does not represent an endorsement by EU DisinfoLab of any organisation.