Dietmar Pichler

Vice President “Vienna Goes Europe”
Founder “Disinfo Resilience Network”
Austria

Dietmar Pichler is a freelance media literacy trainer and disinformation analyst from Vienna, Austria. He is Vice President of the Vienna-based NGO ‘Vienna Goes Europe’ and the founder of the initiative ‘Disinfo Resilience Network,’ which aims to connect experts from various fields to analyze, debunk, and expose disinformation and propaganda activities. The focus of his work is on foreign interference conducted by autocratic regimes, especially the Russian Federation.

He has continuously visited Ukraine since 2011 and has monitored Russian propaganda aimed at Western societies, particularly since the annexation of Crimea and the covert invasion of Donbas in 2014. In 2024, he published the policy brief “Disinformation and Foreign Interference: A Challenge for the EU and Its Member States” with the Austrian Society for European Politics, where he provided several recommendations to address this challenge for European democracies.

@DietmarPichler1

I am very moved, especially because I was not expecting to hear these words, which are like an embrace for me. So I want to thank you for this award, for the incredibly moving words of Giovanni di Lorenzo, for this wonderful sky that has welcomed me to Potsdam, and also to thank the Federal Chancellor for her touching words, and for her encouraging presence. Because the awareness raised heartens me a lot more than words. Roberto Saviano, M100 Media Award laureate 2016
It is a great honour for me to be here and receive this great price. It's a very big day for me. I thank Federal Chancellor Angela Merkel and Dr. Joachim Gauck for the kind and strong words, and for their appreciation. Thank you, I will never forget this day! Kurt Westergaard, danish cartoonist, M100 Media Award laureate 2010
At the same time, today’s prize is an appeal to all persons who hold positions of responsibility in governments, in culture and in the media: be steadfast, value-oriented and also COURAGEOUS when irresponsible persons and powers undermine or relativise our values of freedom. It is a virtue to yield to a convincing argument, but it is cowardice to yield to a threat from enemies of freedom. Joachim Gauck in his laudation to Kurt Westergaard, 2010
I receive [this award] with an immense joy, happiness and humility also, because I think by being with you today here, I am receiving this price in the name of those who are still suffering in the jungle of Colombia and of those in the world that are living in similar conditions and who cannot speak for themselves freely. Ingrid Betancourt, M100 Media Award laureate 2008
But I have to say that in our modern society the media has a very, very particular responsibility, also for the European idea. And I hope that the event today – and the events which will follow – will help us to communicate better, to explain better and to convince people that Europe – and acknowledging all the problems, the mistakes and the deficits – […] that at the end of the day the idea of European integration is the best idea that we have ever developed in our history. Günther Verheugen, former EU-Commissioner, in his keynote speech 2005