• Priority Area Multidisciplinary Investigations on Disinformation in Europe
• Year 2023, 2024
• Country Netherlands
• Project Status Ongoing

Organised disinformation campaigns targeting the LGBTQ+ community attempt to undermine European values and threaten vulnerable communities. For example, members of the LGBTQ+ community were falsely singled out as being responsible for the spread of Coronavirus. These campaigns tend to be conducted online, but little is known about the extent of their impact on the World Wide Web.

This project examines the role played by search engines in the propagation of disinformation relating to the European LGBTQ+ community. For example, which attitudes towards the LGBTQ+ community do search engines promote, and which do they suppress? Questions like these are vitally important because search engines are increasingly used by many millions of European citizens to inform themselves. To address these issues, this project brings together experts on search engine monitoring, extremism in Europe, and LGBTQ+ rights. Using monitoring technology developed at the Tilburg Algorithm Observatory, and with a particular focus on Eastern Europe, the project will monitor different search engines in different regions, languages, and in relation to different LGBTQ+ issues. More generally, European citizens are exposed to online information spaces and technologies that are controlled by non-European entities. Which technologies are needed to monitor these spaces, how can disinformation be detected, and how should citizens, especially those from vulnerable groups, be informed about online safety? By examining how search engines propagate or suppress disinformation relating to the LGBTQ+ community, this project will inform these pressing questions about the future of the world wide web.