Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Media Technology IDMTOnline disinformation and fake media content have become a serious threat to democracy, the economy, and society. Recent advances in AI now enable the creation of realistic synthetic content and its automatic dissemination through AI-driven bot networks. This makes it increasingly difficult for researchers and media professionals to assess the truthfulness and credibility of online content and recognize disinformation campaigns.
vera.ai aims to provide professional, trustworthy AI solutions against advanced disinformation techniques, developed in collaboration with media professionals and researchers, laying the foundation for future research in AI against disinformation. Core aspects of the activities are transparency (including explainability), robustness, and the ability to handle multilingual and multimodal content. The AI tools developed and used within vera.ai are based on continuously collected fact-checking data derived from tens of thousands of pieces of "real-world" content. Furthermore, social media and web content can be analyzed and contextualized to detect disinformation campaigns and measure their impact. Results are validated by professional journalists and fact-checkers from the project partners (DW, AFP, EUDL, EBU) and associated partners.