Censorship Industrial Complex
WEF Davos 2025: Attendees at annual meeting wrestling for control of information
World Economic Forum’s Prioritizes “Disinformation” Over Economic and Global Stability Threats
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The World Economic Forum (WEF) is gearing up for its Davos meeting, set to take place January 20-24, and the group has now released the Global Risks Report 2025.
The report is based on “insights” from the Global Risks Perception Survey that take into account the opinions of 900 “global leaders” across business, government, academia and civil society, the WEF said. The report reflects the unrelenting drive still present in many corners of the world and among political elites to push what they consider “disinformation” to the top of this agenda. And so the WEF paper talks about “armed conflict, environment, and disinformation” as “top threats” this year. And that, as the authors note, from their point of view leaves economic risks as having “less immediate prominence.” Meanwhile, “mis/disinformation” is ranked higher as a threat and that has happened two years in a row. This reads like another instance of taking an alarmist approach to “disinformation” (which then comes in handy when pushing all sorts of controversial policies, affecting online speech, security, and technology development). The WEF report elevates “disinformation” to a “persistent threat to societal cohesion and governance by eroding trust” – and even “exacerbating divisions within and between nations” and “complicating” ways to cooperate on ending international crises. And, when AI is thrown into the mix in its “adverse” form – “disinformation” underpins rising geopolitical tensions. The way the report frames the issue of disinformation, that seems to be the only thing standing in the way of world peace. While creating high drama around “disinformation” is one piece of the puzzle, the WEF also looks at long-term threats, such as to the environment. This, according to the document, will be dominant over the next decade, and this is the language the group uses: “(…) led by extreme weather events, biodiversity loss and ecosystem collapse.” With the threats presented like this, the “solutions” are also very much in line with the WEF mission: promote more and more globalization, even as many countries might be looking to what the group disapprovingly calls, “turning inward.” Instead, the WEF wants them to essentially double down on globalization, allegedly as the only way to “prevent a downward spiral of instability.” One of the goals the WEF promotes – and is also one of the five overall topics of this year’s Davos meeting – is “rebuilding trust.” Now, if only this group would focus more on explaining how that trust was lost. |
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Presented as a defense of democracy, the plan reads more like the architecture of a managed reality.
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European authorities have finally unveiled the “European Democracy Shield,” we’ve been warning about for some time, a major initiative that consolidates and broadens existing programs of the European Commission to monitor and restrict digital information flows.
Though branded as a safeguard against “foreign information manipulation and interference (FIMI)” and “disinformation,” the initiative effectively gives EU institutions unprecedented authority over the online public sphere.
At its core, the framework fuses a variety of mechanisms into a single structure, from AI-driven content detection and regulation of social media influencers to a state-endorsed web of “fact-checkers.”
The presentation speaks of defending democracy, yet the design reveals a machinery oriented toward centralized control of speech, identity, and data.
One of the more alarming integrations links the EU’s Digital Identity program with content filtering and labelling systems.
The Commission has announced plans to “explore possible further measures with the Code’s signatories,” including “detection and labelling of AI-generated and manipulated content circulating on social media services” and “voluntary user-verification tools.”
Officials describe the EU Digital Identity (EUDI) Wallet as a means for “secure identification and authentication.”
In real terms, tying verified identity to online activity risks normalizing surveillance and making anonymity in expression a thing of the past.
The Democracy Shield also includes the creation of a “European Centre for Democratic Resilience,” led by Justice Commissioner Michael McGrath.
Framed as a voluntary coordination hub, its mission is “building capacities to withstand foreign information manipulation and interference (FIMI) and disinformation,” involving EU institutions, Member States, and “neighboring countries and like-minded partners.”
The Centre’s “Stakeholder Platform” is to unite “trusted stakeholders such as civil society organizations, researchers and academia, fact-checkers and media providers.”
In practice, this structure ties policymaking, activism, and media oversight into one cooperative network, eroding the boundaries between government power and public discourse.
Financial incentives reinforce the system. A “European Network of Fact-Checkers” will be funded through EU channels, positioned as independent yet operating within the same institutional framework that sets the rules.
The network will coordinate “fact-checking” in every EU language, maintain a central database of verdicts, and introduce “a protection scheme for fact-checkers in the EU against threats and harassment.”
Such an arrangement destroys the line between independent verification and state-aligned narrative enforcement.
The Commission will also fund a “common research support framework,” giving select researchers privileged access to non-public platform data via the
Digital Services Act (DSA) and Political Advertising Regulation.
Officially, this aims to aid academic research, but it could also allow state-linked analysts to map, classify, and suppress online viewpoints deemed undesirable.
Plans extend further into media law. The European Commission intends to revisit the Audiovisual Media Services Directive (AVMSD) to ensure “viewers – particularly younger ones – are adequately protected when they consume audiovisual content online.”
While framed around youth protection, such language opens the door to broad filtering and regulation of online media.
Another initiative seeks to enlist digital personalities through a “voluntary network of influencers to raise awareness about relevant EU rules, including the DSA.” Brussels will “consider the role of influencers” during its upcoming AVMSD review.
Though presented as transparent outreach, the move effectively turns social media figures into de facto promoters of official EU messaging, reshaping public conversation under the guise of awareness.
The Shield also introduces a “Digital Services Act incidents and crisis protocol” between the EU and signatories of the Code of Practice on Disinformation to “facilitate coordination among relevant authorities and ensure swift reactions to large-scale and potentially transnational information operations.”
This could enable coordinated suppression of narratives across borders. Large platforms exceeding 45 million EU users face compliance audits, with penalties reaching 6% of global revenue or even platform bans, making voluntary cooperation more symbolic than real.
A further layer comes with the forthcoming “Blueprint for countering FIMI and disinformation,” offering governments standardized guidance to “anticipate, detect and respond” to perceived information threats. Such protocols risk transforming free expression into a regulated domain managed under preemptive suspicion.
Existing structures are being fortified, too. The European Digital Media Observatory (EDMO), already central to “disinformation” monitoring, will receive expanded authority for election and crisis surveillance. This effectively deepens the fusion of state oversight and online communication control.
Funding through the “Media Resilience Programme” will channel EU resources to preferred outlets, while regulators examine ways to “strengthen the prominence of media services of general interest.”
This includes “impact investments in the news media sector” and efforts to build transnational platforms promoting mainstream narratives. Though described as supporting “independent and local journalism,” the model risks reinforcing state-aligned voices while sidelining dissenting ones.
Education and culture are not exempt. The Commission plans “Guidelines for teachers and educators on tackling disinformation and promoting digital literacy through education and training,” along with new “media literacy” programs and an “independent network for media literacy.”
While such initiatives appear benign, they often operate on the assumption that government-approved information is inherently trustworthy, conditioning future generations to equate official consensus with truth.
Viewed as a whole, the European Democracy Shield represents a major institutional step toward centralized narrative management in the European Union.
Under the language of “protection,” Brussels is constructing a comprehensive apparatus for monitoring and shaping the flow of information.
For a continent that once defined itself through open debate and free thought, this growing web of bureaucratic control signals a troubling shift.
Efforts framed as defense against disinformation now risk becoming tools for suppressing dissent, a paradox that may leave European democracy less free in the name of making it “safe.”
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Censorship Industrial Complex
School Cannot Force Students To Use Preferred Pronouns, US Federal Court Rules
From the Daily Caller News Foundation
“Our system forbids public schools from becoming ‘enclaves of totalitarianism.’”
A federal appeals court in Ohio ruled Thursday that students cannot be forced to use preferred pronouns in school.
Defending Education (DE) filed the suit against Olentangy Local School District (OLSD) in 2023, arguing the district’s anti-harassment policy that requires students to use the “preferred pronouns” of others violates students’ First Amendment rights by “compelling students to affirm beliefs about sex and gender that are contrary to their own deeply held beliefs.” Although a lower court attempted to shoot down the challenge, the appeals court ruled in a 10-7 decision that the school cannot “wield their authority to compel speech or demand silence from citizens who disagree with the regulators’ politically controversial preferred new form of grammar.”
Because the school considers transgender students to be a protected class, students who violated the anti-harassment policy by referring to such students by their biological sex risked punishments such as suspension and expulsion, according to DE.
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“American history and tradition uphold the majority’s decision to strike down the school’s pronoun policy,” the court wrote in its opinion. “Over hundreds of years, grammar has developed in America without governmental interference. Consistent with our historical tradition and our cherished First Amendment, the pronoun debate must be won through individual persuasion, not government coercion. Our system forbids public schools from becoming ‘enclaves of totalitarianism.’”
OLSD did not respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.
“We are deeply gratified by the Sixth Circuit’s intensive analysis not only of our case but the state of student First Amendment rights in the modern era,” Nicole Neily, founder and president of DE, said in a statement. “The court’s decision – and its many concurrences – articulate the importance of free speech, the limits and perils of public schools claiming to act in loco parentis, and the critical role of persuasion – rather than coercion – in America’s public square.”
“Despite its ham-fisted attempt to moot the case, Olentangy School District was sternly reminded by the 6th circuit en banc court that it cannot force students to express a viewpoint on gender identity with which they disagree, nor extend its reach beyond the schoolhouse threshold into matters better suited to an exercise of parental authority,” Sarah Parshall Perry, vice president and legal fellow at DE, said in a statement. “A resounding victory for student speech and parental rights was long overdue for families in the school district and we are thrilled the court’s ruling will benefit others seeking to vindicate their rights in the classroom and beyond.”
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