• National politicians are the most frequently mentioned by Spaniards (57%) as a major disinformation threat, followed by the international political class (45%) and influencers (45%).

• Social networks are perceived as the main channel for spreading disinformation (73% of respondents consider them a threat), ahead of digital media (25%) or search engines (15%).

• Only 18% of those surveyed in Spain said they had received training on how to use the media, compared to 74% who said they had not.

The proliferation of hoaxes and misinformation has serious consequences for citizens, as it erodes trust in institutions and the media, polarizes society and makes it difficult to make informed and free decisions. The 2025 survey data reveal that Spanish society seems aware of these threats, with a high percentage of respondents expressing concern about online hoaxes. Sixty-nine percent of respondents say they are totally or partially concerned about misinformation, a figure very close to the 70% recorded in 2024, which saw the highest year-on-year increase since data has been available. In contrast, only 9% say they are not concerned about this phenomenon.

In addition to disinformation campaigns around events such as the general elections of 2023 and the European elections of 2024, episodes such as the DANA that affected Valencia in October 2024 or international conflicts, it is possible that the rapid development and popularization of artificial intelligence (AI) tools, capable of generating increasingly realistic false content, is intensifying social concern about the difficulty of distinguishing between the true and the false. The survey data seem to corroborate that there is some relationship between the two variables: those who say they are uncomfortable with AI-generated news with some human supervision are more concerned about misinformation on the Internet - 79% of them say they are partially or totally concerned - than those who are comfortable with such content (65%).

One of the most concerned countries

69% of Spanish users are concerned about misinformation. This percentage places Spain among the countries with the greatest concern about this topic, according to the results obtained in the 48 markets analyzed. This figure is 11 points higher than the global average (58%) and 15 points higher than the European average (54%).

Our country appears in position issue 9, behind several African states (Nigeria and Kenya offer the highest levels of concern, above 80%; South Africa has 73%), Australia, the United States and very close to the 71% of the United Kingdom, Portugal and Singapore.

Concern is growing, especially amongespecially among the youngest

If we look at sociodemographic variables such as age, gender, educational level, income level and ideology, the trends of recent years in Spain are confirmed. The higher the age, training and income level, the greater the concern; and women are more worried about false and misleading information than men.

By age, respondents over 55 years of age report greater concern about misinformation (74%) compared to younger age groups. However, data from the last five years show an upward trend in all age groups, with particularly notable peaks in 2021 and 2024. In the case of adults under the age of 24, concern has grown by more than ten points in three years, from 55% in 2022 to 66% in 2025. It also highlights that in 2025, the 45-54 age group has again reached 70% concern, consolidating a steady increase since 2022.

Women are more concerned than men about misinformation (74% vs. 64%). Moreover, their concern has grown considerably faster since 2020, increasing ten percentage points in five years, while men's concern has remained more stable.

As in previous years, there is also a positive relationship between levels of Education and income and concern about the veracity of information. And there is also greater concern among groups with political leanings to the left: 75% are totally or partially concerned, compared to 65% of those on the right and 71% of those in the center. Respondents who are far removed from politics or who do not fall on the ideological spectrum reveal lower levels of concern about misinformation (56%), however, they are the ones who show the greatest leap in recent years: their concern about hoaxes has increased eight points since 2020 (from 48% to 56%).

Politicians, considered the greatest threat

Given the high levels of concern about misinformation observed in the last survey, this year we have delved into some related questions, such as the perception of the main threats, the sources to which citizens turn to verify information whose veracity they doubt or whether they have received any Education on how to use the news, training that could help them to detect hoaxes, combat misinformation and minimize their risks.

With regard to the false and misleading information circulating on the Internet today, respondents were order to indicate which of several options they consider to be a major threat in general. The option indicated by the highest percentage of people - both men and women, in every age range and at all educational and income levels, without exception - was politicians, especially those of our country. Six out of ten (57%) respondents consider them to be a major threat in relation to false and misleading information. This is pointed out by men (58%) and women (55%), and they are distrusted to a greater extent by those respondents in the highest age groups: 64% of Internet users aged 65 and over, compared to 53% of those aged 18-24. According to political affinity, respondents who identify with the right perceive Spanish politicians and political parties as a threat to a greater extent than those on the left (61% versus 56%).

The figure of 57% of distrust in politicians places Spain ten points above the average in the 48 countries surveyed (47%) and at the same level as the United States (57%), which in the weeks in which the survey was conducted was experiencing the second inauguration of Donald Trump as president.

The perception of politicians as a source of disinformation is not limited to the national level. Some 45% of those surveyed also point to foreign governments, politicians and parties as important sources of hoaxes, although always below the level attributed to the Spanish political class .

Influencers and internet personalities are perceived as a threat to the veracity of information by almost half of the respondents (45%), a figure similar to the average for the 48 countries (47%). By age group, those who trust them the most are young people between 18 and 24 years old, 30% of whom point to influencers as a risk in relation to false information, fifteen points below the average. At the other extreme, 57% of Internet users over the age of 65 have checked this option. In the ideological field, differences also appear: a higher percentage of respondents on the left (52%) consider that Internet personalities pose a danger in this regard, compared to those on the right (40%).

And what about the media: are they perceived as a threat that spreads disinformation? The data show that 40% of those surveyed consider them to be so, eight points above the global average for the 48 countries (32%). This perception increases the higher the educational and economic level of the users. In the first case, while among those with low or medium programs of study , distrust ranges between 34% and 38%, it reaches 49% among those with higher Education . In the case of income level, those who earn less perceive the media with less concern (35%) than those who earn more (43%). We should bear in mind, however, that in all the cases proposed in the question, the groups with higher income and higher educational level tend to show higher percentages of threat perception, except when it comes to distrust of ordinary people. In ideological terms, both those on the left (46%) and on the right (42%) are more distrustful of the media than centrists (38%) and those who do not identify themselves politically (33%).

In general, Internet users mostly trust normal people: only 23% consider them to be a danger when it comes to misleading and false information. This is a percentage from which no age group departs and which does not seem to be affected by the economic or educational status of the respondents. However, the difference between different ideological groups is striking: 26% of left-wing respondents consider ordinary people to be a challenge in relation to the veracity of information, compared to 16% of right-wing respondents.

We also asked about the channels considered to be a major threat in this regard. Three out of four respondents marked a social or video network (73%) TikTok appears as the least trusted-, compared to one out of three (33%) who marked instant messaging applications, one out of four (25%) who marked news sites and 15% who marked search engines.

The media is the main resource for verifying information

Despite the fact that 40% of those surveyed consider the media to be a disinformation threat, 34% turn to them when they suspect that a news item may be false or misleading. This option is, in fact, the most frequently mentioned of the various options offered by the survey, both in Spain and in the 48 countries surveyed (38%).

The role of the media as the main informative tool used to counteract hoaxes is especially relevant among the older groups. Forty-five percent of those over 65 years of age turn to news organizations to verify information, compared to a greater distrust among those under 24 years of age (28%).

There are also differences according to income level: only 26% of those with low incomes use the media compared to 37% and 38% among those with medium or high incomes, respectively. In terms of educational level, the use of media as a verification tool increases as training increases: from 29% among those with low programs of study , to 36% withaverage training , and between 38% and 40% in the case of those with higher or university Education . In the ideological field there are no differences -left, center and right show a percentage of 36%-, except for those who are not politically positioned, who use the media to verify information considerably less than the rest (20%).

Those respondents who marked the media as a source verification were order to indicate which of them they consult. Among the responses, national newspapers -especially El País and El Mundo- and television stations -RTVE and Antena 3 are the most frequently mentioned- stand out.

Official sources, such as the government website, are the second most used resource for verifying information (31%), followed by search engines (24%) and data verification websites (23%), among which Maldita and Newtral stand out. Below them are personal sources - 15% say they turn to someone they know and trust and 12% say they look at comments from other internet users - 13% enquiry Wikipedia, 10% turn to social or video networks and 6% turn to AI chatbots, including ChatGPT. It is striking that almost two out of ten respondents (17%) do not know where to go to check apparently false or misleading information.

The preference for the media as a verification resource is confirmed by asking respondents who use search engines or social and video networks which subject of results they look at. Among those who use a search engine, the most chosen sources are the news media and official sources, with 36% each. Thirty-one percent look for a specialized or expert website and 27% for a data verification website. Nineteen percent go to Wikipedia and 17% stick with the summary of the information at the top of the search page. Only 3% and 2% of respondents who use a search engine as a resource choose among the results those related to influencers and internet personalities or politicians, respectively. Among those who say they use social or video networks, such as YouTube or TikTok, half (50%) say they rely on results from news media, ahead of experts (35%), official sources (28%) or data (26%). The least chosen sources are again influencers and internet personalities (16%), Wikipedia (15%) and politicians (9%).

The survey data also show a significant correlation between trust in the media as a means of verification and the perception of its democratic relevance. Those who feel more strongly that the media help them understand democratic processes and participate in society are also more likely to trust the media to verify questionable information, and vice versa. This relationship is not minor, and reflects how the legitimacy of journalism in a democracy is closely linked to its credibility.

Media literacy: a pending task

This year's survey also assessed citizens' media literacy. Citizens were asked whether they have ever received Education or training on how to use the news (e.g., critical understanding of the media, analysis of sources, news-related knowledge , etc.). Such training could have taken place in high school, college or university, either digitally or physically, and in both formal and informal settings.

The results show a pending subject : only 18% of those surveyed in Spain claim to have received training on the use of information, compared to 74% who claim not to have received it and 8% who do not know whether they have received it or not. These data place Spain slightly below the average of the 45 countries analyzed, where 22% say they have received such training, 68% have not received it and 9% do not know.

The social radiography derived from the answers to this question in our country sample a clear generational and educational gap. Older Internet users are less educated than young people and those citizens with lower educational levels are less educated than respondents with medium and higher programs of study . This lower training makes both groups - older and less educationalmore vulnerable to misinformation on the Internet.