UNESCO Preps Global Disinformation Rules as Survey Finds 85% Worried

The survey covered 8,000 people across 16 countries due to hold national elections, with a combined 2.5 billion voters. Ipsos carried it out for UNESCO, the UN's culture body. It was released as UNESCO's director general, Audrey Azoulay, told reporters that false information and hate speech online posed "major risks to social cohesion, peace and stability."

The numbers are blunt. Fifty-six percent of internet users get news mainly from social media, ahead of television at 44% and media sites at 29%. Trust in what they find there is lower than in older media: 50% for social platforms against 66% for television, 63% for radio and 57% for media websites and apps.

Sixty-eight percent named social media as where fake news spreads most, ahead of messaging apps at 38%. UNESCO called that belief "overwhelmingly prevalent in all countries, age groups, social backgrounds and political preferences."

Election pressure, and what regulators want

Concern sharpens around votes. Eighty-nine percent want government and regulatory intervention during campaigns, and 91% expect platforms to be more alert when democracy is directly in play. Hate speech was reported as widespread too: 67% said they had seen it online, rising to 74% among under-35s. Eighty-eight percent said governments and regulators must address both problems, and 90% wanted platforms to act.

UNESCO's plan rests on seven principles. Independent, well-resourced public regulators should be set up everywhere and work together as a network, the organisation said, to stop digital companies exploiting gaps between national rules. Platforms must moderate content effectively and at scale, in all regions and languages, and be "accountable and transparent with regard to algorithms that are too often geared towards maximising engagement at the cost of reliable information." Stronger measures, including risk assessments, content flagging and more transparency around political advertising, are expected during elections and crises such as armed conflicts and disasters.

Guilherme Canela de Souza Godoi, UNESCO's chief of section for freedom of expression, said more than 50 countries already regulate social media, but often not in line with international free speech and human rights norms. The guidelines, he said, are "a strong blueprint based on a human rights approach, designed to inform and inspire governments and regulators," and several African and Latin American countries have expressed interest. UNESCO said one major platform told the 194-member body it would prefer a consistent global framework to a patchwork of national and regional systems. A World Conference of Regulators is planned for 2024. The consultation behind the plan drew more than 10,000 contributions from 134 countries over 18 months, which UNESCO described as unprecedented in the UN system.

Mathieu Gallard of Ipsos said the worry cuts across every category measured: "People are very concerned about disinformation, across every country and social category - age, education, rural or urban. They are especially worried during elections - and they want all actors to fight it."

The blueprint lands in a crowded field. Researchers and journalists have documented coordinated networks ranging from Russian "troll factory" operations to pro-China and pro-India campaigns, and economic operations such as the network of sites run during the 2016 US election by teenagers in a small Macedonian town, according to a guide published by Exposing the Invisible. NewsGuard has reported a network of 125 unreliable AI-generated news sites.

Other reporting shows how quickly such material can turn violent. After three girls were killed in Southport in July, a false name for the attacker spread on X; Hannah Rose of the Institute for Strategic Dialogue told CNBC it had more than 30,000 mentions on the platform alone by the following afternoon. Police said the suspect was born in Britain, but days of riots followed. As the UK's Online Safety Act waits to take effect, the regulator Ofcom has told platforms not to wait for it.