ICS launches COMPASS, a project that aims to strengthen Macedonia’s resilience to Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference (FIMI)

The Institute of Communication Studies (ICS) has started implementing COMPASS – Coordinated Mechanism for Protection Against Strategic Subversion, a 33-month project aimed at strengthening North Macedonia’s institutional resilience to foreign information manipulation and interference (FIMI).

Foreign information manipulation increasingly targets democratic processes, public trust in institutions and the country’s Euro-Atlantic orientation. ICS research has shown that responses so far have largely been reactive and dependent on individual institutions, which leads to overlapping mandates and inconsistent communication with the public. COMPASS seeks to move from ad hoc reactions to a coordinated, preventive approach. The project is built around four components.

The first component improves information exchange between media and institutions, mapping how newsrooms and institutions communicate today, where communication breaks down and what slows the verification of information when manipulative content spreads, which will serve as the basis for developing models of cooperation between the two sides.

The second component supports stronger coordination among state institutions in detecting and responding to FIMI. It starts with an analysis of institutional capacities, and joint development of mechanisms for improved inter-institutional coordination and response to FIMI.

The third component develops investigative journalism on FIMI, so that a lasting network of journalists and newsrooms are able to uncover and explain manipulation campaigns to the public.

The fourth component is research on anti-Western narratives. It produces a series of publicly available case studies grounded in the local context, examining how these narratives are constructed, who spreads them and why they resonate. The research follows a dedicated methodology and undergoes review by international experts.

COMPASS builds on ICS’s long-standing work on information integrity, including ICS’s research on the institutional response to FIMI, and the TRACE and Use Facts projects. The project is funded by the Government of the United Kingdom, with support from the British Embassy in Skopje.