The COVID-19 Pandemic of Disinformation and Hate Speech: How can Education and Digital Citizenship Help? ; Synthesis Report

COVID-19 is not only one of the most significant health crises of our times, but is also an information crisis taking place in a dynamic and constantly evolving scientific environment with uncertainty on many fundamental issues. The information crisis is the result of the plethora of available information and the difficulty in differentiating true from false -or even fake- information, and identifying what content is in a grey and evolving scientific zone.
In this context, education can play an important role in minimizing these risks and promoting values of solidarity and human rights by ensuring that young people, as well as their educators and parents, acquire core competencies of digital citizenship that build resilience to disinformation and misinformation and the exploitation of these by hate-mongers. Education can also help young people engage in the online environment in a safe, sensitive, critical, ethical and accountable way as well as encourage them to play a role in pioneering educational initiatives that contribute to promoting digital citizenship.