Research Support Framework for Situational Awareness on information integrity

The Commission will not provide support to the formation of consortia under this call for proposals.

According to the Digital Europe Programme regulation and the call conditions, to be eligible, the applicants (beneficiaries and affiliated entities) must:

− be legal entities (public or private bodies)

− be established in one of the eligible countries, i.e.:

• EU Member States (including overseas countries and territories (OCTs))
• non-EU countries : − listed EEA countries and countries associated to the Digital Europe Programme (list of participating countries)

The text of the call states that regarding affiliated entities, applicants may participate with affiliated entities (i.e. entities linked to a beneficiary which participate in the action with similar rights and obligations as the beneficiaries, but do not sign the grant and therefore do not become beneficiaries themselves). They will get a part of the grant money and must therefore comply with all the call conditions and be validated (just like beneficiaries); but they do not count towards the minimum eligibility criteria for consortium composition (if any). If affiliated entities participate in your project, please do not forget to provide documents demonstrating their affiliation link to your organisation as part of your application.

The text of the Digital Europe Programme does not state explicit eligibility conditions for subcontractors, therefore an entity established in a non-eligible country could participate.

However, the conditions for subcontracting are to be respected :

If eligible under the Grant Agreement, beneficiaries/affiliated entities may charge ‘Subcontracting costs’. This budget category covers subcontracted action tasks, i.e. contracts for parts of the project described in the description of the action (DoA; Annex 1) that are not implemented by the beneficiary itself, but by a subcontractor.

Only limited parts of the action may be subcontracted — unless explicitly allowed in the call conditions/Grant Agreement.

Limited parts means that subcontracting remains proportionate both in terms of share and type of subcontracted action tasks, as well as in terms of share in the eligible cost.

The costs must comply with the eligibility conditions, in particular:

• fulfil the general conditions for costs to be eligible (i.e. incurred during the action duration, necessary, linked to the action, etc,…)
• be based either on the best value for money (considering the quality of the service, good or work proposed, i.e. the best price-quality ratio) or on the lowest price
• not be subject to conflict of interest and
• for beneficiaries that are ‘contracting authorities’ or ‘contracting entities’ within the meaning of the EU Public Procurement Directives (Directives 2014/24, 2014/25 and 2009/81) : comply with the applicable national law on public procurement; these rules normally provide for special procurement procedures for the types of contracts they cover.

The beneficiaries can in principle freely choose between best value for money and lowest price. Best value for money applies the general cost eligibility condition (i.e. that costs must be reasonable and comply with the principle of sound financial management) to the subcontracting context.

A competitive selection of subcontractors should be the default approach since it is the safest way to ensure no conflict of interest, best value for money or lowest price through direct comparisons between offers. However, subcontracting does not necessarily require competitive selection procedures to be eligible, provided that, in case of a check, review, audit or investigation, the beneficiary can prove compliance with best value for money or lowest price AND no conflict of interest, for instance by showing:

• data from a previous competitive tender on a similar subject that confirms the market value
• a conducted market consultation, e.g. price quotations, supplier brochures, or consultation with help of independent experts.

Proposals are encouraged to thoroughly research existing initiatives in the area of facilitating research on the information environment, and design their activities in ways that complement or incorporate the results of such initiatives. Such complementarity considerations can also include reflections on existing initiatives at the international level. At the same time, it is important to keep in mind that the possibilities for entities established outside of countries associated to the Digital Europe Programme to partake in the action or receive grant money are limited (for more information please consult section 6 and 13 of the call for proposals), and that the delivery of the objectives and deliverables of the project should not be causally dependent on the conduct of entities or initiatives that are not formally linked to the project.

A clear description of the design of the project, including the way in which the specific objectives will be achieved, is an important part of the application. The proposal should demonstrate why the activities proposed for the delivery of the specific objectives are pertinent and effective. For specific objectives 1, 2 and 4, this also includes the reflection on why the chosen approach to deliver them either via consortium activities, FSTP, or a mix of both, is effective in terms of logical coherence and budget allocation. An important element to take into account when designing the project plan are also the two different reimbursement rates under this call, which are 100% for consortium activities and 50% for FSTP activities - certain parts of the action, such as the securing of technical infrastructure, may be faster and easier to achieve with consortium activities.

Designing the project plan in a complementary manner is also possible. For example, approaches such as proposing to deliver a baseline implementation of a specific objective via consortium activities that would then be upgraded, complemented or further refined through an FSTP action, are fully valid.

An information session for interested stakeholders will be held on 28 April, 15:00 - 16:30 CET. The session will feature a presentation of the call and provide the opportunity for interested stakeholders to ask questions.

If you would like to attend the session, please register via the following link: https://ec.europa.eu/eusurvey/runner/DIGITAL-2026-BESTUSE-RSF-10-AWARENESS

All materials used during the session will be made available on the CNECT web-page after the session. Questions from participants will also inform the Questions and Answers section on this page.

Article 40 of the DSA establishes an obligation for providers of very large online platforms and very large online search engines to give researchers access to data.

Proposals are encouraged to document, develop and promote existing best practices for accessing online platforms data and subsequently conducting research in a secure manner upholding confidentiality and privacy. This exercise should encompass the full research cycle, starting with the scoping of the relevant data to be accessed to study online systemic risks, the appropriate modalities for giving access to the data, the analytical tools enabling effective research with the data, and finally, the publication of research outputs.

To identify best practices, it is relevant to monitor projects who obtain access to data under the DSA but also the broader ecosystem of technical and legal experts mobilised in the making of a successful data access application. This includes for instance data protection experts, providers of secure research environments or individuals or companies with knowledge regarding the data that could be made available by online platforms.