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In April 2024, experts from the Center for Digital Safety & Security at the AIT Austrian Institute of Technology conducted a special tabletop (TTX) simulation game on behalf of the Federal Chancellery in order to effectively prepare the Austrian administration for possible disinformation campaigns in the forthcoming elections in Austria.
Especially ahead of the European elections and the upcoming Austrian national elections, the protection of our democratic processes and their integrity takes on a new fundamental importance. Disinformation also fuels fears, leading to increased prejudice and insecurity in parts of society and thus undermining trust in our democratic institutions.
Against this backdrop, the Austrian federal ministries organised a joint training course on "Preventing Election Interference" with the Hybrid Center of Excellence in Helsinki (Hybrid CoE) and commissioned the AIT Austrian Institute of Technology to design and conduct a special interministerial exercise to specifically address disinformation campaigns. The aim was to develop and implement joint strategies for combating and containing disinformation, with a particular focus on various social media channels as platforms for the rapid dissemination of fake content. The AIT experts drew on their extensive experience and AIT's particular expertise in the development of data science and AI methods in order to recognise fake news and disinformation in the digital space earlier and, above all, more effectively.
In the course of the exercise, the focus was also on incorporating the experiences and best practice approaches of other EU member states and reviewing existing structures of interministerial cooperation in Austria in order to make a sustainable contribution to strengthening joint interministerial action to effectively combat disinformation.
Over 50 people from almost all federal ministries as well as representatives of civil society took part in the presentations and exercises, which took place in the ceremonial hall of the Federal Ministry of Defence (BMLV) under the auspices of the Federal Chancellery and with the support of the BMLV.