Investigations

Polarisation is being exploited repeatedly in political rhetoric and forms the bedrock of much of the disinformation circulating in Malta and other places, not least in the United States.

Through this report, by focusing on Facebook, MedDMO demonstrates that deepfake-powered scams have emerged on social media platforms in Greece. Since late 2022, fact-checkers have identified several cases of fraudulent advertisements using AI-generated content, representing a notable evolution from traditional online fraud tactics.

Multiple false narratives about COVID-19 vaccines and their alleged harmful effects have spread across Cyprus, including fabricated stories about celebrity deaths caused by vaccines, distorted research findings about cancer survival rates and false claims about vaccines’ effect on behaviour. This report examines how some of these claims originated and made their way across the country.

This report examines a disinformation campaign promoting various unproven alternative medicine therapies and substances as miraculous cures for serious medical conditions. These narratives exploit people’s desire for simple, natural solutions to complex health problems while deliberately omitting critical safety information and scientific evidence.

In 2000, the Maltese government granted a private company a 99-year lease to develop two abandoned sites steeped in history on Malta’s north-eastern coast, including Manoel Island, a small island measuring just 0.3km , home to a magnificent fort and lazzaretto and nestled within one of Malta’s natural harbours.

Five years after the COVID-19 pandemic, disinformation about vaccines remains widespread across Greece. Some falsely claim that vaccines are linked to aggressive forms of cancer, others distort studies to link them to genetic disorders and sudden deaths. This report examines some of the more prominent and problematic claims.

In a country that suffers from deep polarisation, protest for political accountability is dismissed as a partisan act. Malta’s ruling party, the Labour Party, particularly capitalised on this in early 2025, when civil society fought against the magisterial inquiry reform bill that was widely regarded as an attack on the rule of law. By propagating the narrative that civil society is an extremist faction of the Opposition, the government and its media have fostered social division as a means of exerting control.

The podcast run by controversial MEP Feidias Panagiotou has featured a series of misleading claims about the Russian-Ukraine war, including descriptions of the conflict as a civil war, rather than an international invasion. This report discusses some of the more prominent claims made on Panagiotou’s podcast.

Ukraine is frequently depicted as playing a double game with its key Western allies through a series of false or misleading claims about land ownership, strategic resources, and population statistics.

This report examines several false claims shared across Cyprus about the alleged dwindling support that the Ukrainian cause is enjoying around Europe.