• Priority Area Supporting Research into Media, Disinformation and Information Literacy Across Europe
• Year 2024, 2025, 2026
• Country Finland, France, Poland, Slovakia, Spain
• Project Status Ongoing

The SIMODS project (Structural Indicators to Monitor Online Disinformation Scientifically) aims to develop a comprehensive and rigorous methodology to measure the effectiveness of the EU’s Code of Practice on Disinformation. Building on  current initiatives to measure disinformation, the project focuses on four key dimensions: the prevalence of disinformation, sources of disinformation, ad placement and monetization, and cross-platform disinformation.

The project’s primary goal is to produce the most robust measure of structural indicators (SIs) to date, providing critical insights to inform EU-wide discussions on tackling disinformation. By covering six major social media platforms in four languages (French, Polish, Slovak, and Spanish), SIMODS will offer a statistically significant and methodologically sound assessment that is relevant across the EU.

SIMODS adds value by addressing the current challenges in measuring disinformation, including the need for indicators that are comparable across platforms, languages, and time. The project involves large-scale data collection, content and account annotation by professional fact-checkers, and the development of new tools to measure SIs effectively.

Targets include creating standardized methodologies for classifying disinformation, measuring five structural indicators, and covering six platforms in four languages over two time periods. The project’s findings will support regulators, researchers, civil society organizations, and platforms in improving the monitoring and regulation of online disinformation across Europe.