• Priority Area Boosting Fact-checking Activities in Europe
• Funding Round / Action Types 2nd Funding Round – Scale-up Projects
• Year 2022, 2023
• Country Spain
• Project Status Ongoing

FAST is a disinformation early warning and response system for fact-checking organizations that combines cutting edge technological tools with innovative workflow approaches to debunking and dissemination. Bringing together a leading fact-checker Maldita.es, and the Spanish news agency Servimedia, the system aims to enhance the efficiency and impact of debunking and prebunking responses to reduce the spread and prevent the viralization of disinformation campaigns emerging in crisis situations or relating to climate, gender and migration.

With fact-checking organizations under heightened pressure to develop quicker and more impactful responses, this project will scale-up and accelerate the debunking and prebunking capacities of Maldita.es with a new early detection algorithm and alerts service that will automate the identification of emerging disinformation campaigns. Combined with an emergency task force of specialized journalists, engineers, and community builders operating under a novel and innovative workflow, this tool will transform the agility of our fact-checking responses in crisis situations while maintaining their quality. In collaboration with Servimedia, the debunked content will then be disseminated via a multiplatform strategy that will draw on both organizations extensive reach within the fact-checking and traditional media environments, and Spanish-speaking publics.

Augmenting the speed, reach, and impact of Maldita.es’ debunked content, FAST will enhance our capacities to tackle disinformation before it viralizes on public social media, whilst amplifying fact-checked publications in the traditional media. Preemptively confronting disinformation, FAST will significantly mitigate its impact and ensure citizens are able to face crises or contentious issues equipped with accurate and reliable information. Ultimately, FAST is envisioned as a model for early response fact-checking to advance the development of more efficient fact-checking in Europe.