„We should take into account that the modern information technologies open a wide range of possibilities which, being implemented purposefully, may influence directly the society’s awareness and system of values”, Minister of Defence Artis Pabriks indicates, stressing the necessity for experts, journalists and academicians to join their efforts in studying the urgent challenges in information space and looking for solutions how to protect it. For this end, on November 7, Ministry of Defence and National Defence Academy organized the discussion “Baltic Countries’ Information Space – Similarities and Differences, Challenges and Possibilities”. Rinalds Gulbis, researcher from the Centre for East European Policy Studies (CEEPS), was among the invited experts making their presentations at the event.
In his presentation, R.Gulbis stressed the importance of influence of myths, referring to the recent research by himself and the other CEEPS’s researcher Maris Cepuritis “Foreign Policy Myths in Latvia: European Union and Russia”, as well as the works of Ukrainian professor Georgiy Pocheptsov, specialist in information warfare issues. Gulbis indicated that myth is the result of information warfare where fight for people’s hearts and minds is ongoing. “We are neighbouring a large, controlled by authoritarian means information space, lacking democratic and liberal orientation. We allow voluntarily the information from the neighbouring country, where it is purposefully prepared for producing the necessary impact, to enter our space”, the researcher said. He also advised to comprehend and make the choice – to which “club of friends” do we belong: the one of EU member states or the one of Russia, reminding that since we are the EU member country associating ourselves with the West European cultural space, then these are the values that we have to accept. The fact that a part of Latvian population does not consider themselves as Europeans is explained by Gulbis as the result of strong influence on the part of the mass media. Latvian mass media pay too much attention to information on Russia, leaving the news from European countries to the background.
The discussion was joined also by the journalist and organization “Russian Community in Latvia” board member Igor Vatolin, 11th Saeima deputy Inara Murniece, National Electronic Mass Media Council chairman Ainars Dimants and National Computer Security Incident Response Team representative Gints Malkalnietis, as well as experts from Lithuania and Estonia.
The deputy Murniece stressed that the mass media is the matter of national security. Countries compete with each other for influence, using also information environment in this fight, therefore, we should take care of protection of our information space. If a part of population is living in information space of the other country, having the other country’s values and reflecting events from non-democratic point of view, then in the course of time our people may accept these values and begin thinking in a similar way. Our information space is quite small and vulnerable. Murniece warned that it can easily comply with influence on the part of larger mass media spaces.
Dimants underlined the fact, causing significant problem, that Latvian people do not appreciate public television. It is much more popular in the other countries. Thereby, the state has to draw the right conclusions and set up a joint, strong medium with a competitive content for the population to receive quality information produced in Latvia, the National Electronic Mass Media Council chairman stressed.