Lisbon, June 17, 2025 (Lusa) - Portugal remains among the countries most concerned about disinformation on the Internet, with 71% of Portuguese expressing concern about the phenomenon, particularly with regard to influencers and politicians, according to the Digital News Report Portugal 2025 (DNRPT25) released on Tuesday.
The DNRPT25 has been produced annually by OberCom - Observatório da Comunicação since 2015, published alongside the global report by RISJ - Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, at the University of Oxford, in the United Kingdom.
With fieldwork carried out by YouGov, the project surveyed around 97,000 Internet users in 48 countries worldwide in 2025. This year, Serbia joins the group of global markets under study, following the inclusion of Morocco in 2024.
“In 2025, 71% of Portuguese people say they are concerned about disinformation and what is real or fake on the Internet, a level of concern higher than the global average (58%) and which places Portugal among the countries most concerned about this phenomenon,” the report highlights.
The level of concern about disinformation “remains virtually unchanged from previous years” and is “particularly high among older people, the most educated, those with higher incomes and those with a defined political orientation”.
The relationship between trust in news and concern about disinformation “also remains consistent: those who trust the news tend to show higher levels of concern (79%) than those who do not (74%)”, the document states.
With regard to the main threats in terms of disinformation, “the Portuguese point mainly to ‘influencers’ and online personalities (51%) and national politicians (44%), followed by foreign governments or actors and activists (both 39%)”.
In terms of concern about social media as a vehicle for disinformation, this “remains high, with Facebook (56%) and TikTok (55%) standing out as the platforms most associated with this risk”.
Perceptions vary according to age, gender and socioeconomic profile.
According to the study, “younger people tend to see TikTok, X (formerly Twitter) and Instagram as the biggest sources of concern, while older people place greater weight on the role of politicians and ’influencers’”.
Search engines, news sites and conversations between acquaintances “are consistently seen as less problematic in terms of spreading disinformation, regardless of demographic profile,” according to the report.
The fieldwork took place between January 13, 2024 and February 24, 2024 this year.
In Portugal, 2,012 individuals were surveyed.
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