In Poland, Public Discourse Is Heavily Driven by Online Tools

This interview with JAKUB SZYMIK, founder of CEE Digital Democracy Watch, focuses on the prevalence of social media in Poland, their use as a tool for communicating with the public, and other related practices.

The interview is part of a series of conversations initiated by the Region Research Center with experts from different countries, exploring the role of social media in their respective societies։

- Which social media platforms are most widely used by residents of Poland? And what factors influence people’s choice of these platforms?

J. Sz. - The most used social media platforms in Poland would definitely be Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube. Those are the platforms that have 15 to 20 million of users and they are leading when it comes to reach in Poland.

What is interesting is that the video-driven platforms such as TikTok, they have the highest average time spent on the platform. So even if they don't have as many users as other platforms, the average user will spend many hours per month up to 20, 25 hours, which is equivalent to spending one full day each month on a specific platform.

But this is not all. Twitter is very popular in Poland. It's a platform that has around 8 million users. Not all the countries have such a strong presence of X (Twitter).

And also, we can't skip the fact that more and more people are using chat applications as social media platforms. This would be Telegram, Signal, those closed groups. And at the same time, we are seeing a big rise in the use of AI chatbots and AI-mediated tools. They are not social media networks, but they are really impacting the information space in Poland.

- Who is currently winning the competition for public attention: traditional media (television, online/print media) or social networks? Which communication channels do the government, opposition groups, and civil society representatives prefer to use when addressing the public, especially during critical periods such as elections, political and other crises, or when sharing urgent news?

J. Sz. - I think the weight of public communication is definitely moving online. Of course, the mainstream media are still quite popular, but there is a constant drop in use of the traditional media that's combined with the rise of the alternative media or social media, internet mediated platforms.

And this is also visible throughout the elections. In our presidential elections in 2025, we had examples of candidates who were social media personalities, and they were able to drive the conversation on many issues and to host events such as the most-watched globally livestream with participation of two candidates in the final round of the election. These new types of political communication are something we're witnessing very heavily here in Poland.

And this is not only about the candidates, but the broader political spectrum. We are able to confirm that monthly, there are around 60 to 80,000 posts by political actors in Poland being published. And I'm talking about MPs and senators.

So this is quite a mass of content. At the same time, we are seeing a rise in use of smaller media platforms, podcasts, YouTube channels, Spotify, podcasts too. And this space is growing when it comes to having the political sway in the country.

- And what about the officials? Does the government communicate with society through social media?

J. Sz. - Yes. And it's something that is becoming more and more controversial: how to communicate actively as a government when you don't have ownership of the platform that you're using to communicate. So yes, the government is using Twitter, is using official websites to communicate, and is creating lots of advertising campaigns that use those new types of media.

But at the same time, there are more and more conversations about whether this is a reliable way of sharing information. If you're a citizen and you can't have access to public communication because you're not a user of specific social media platform, is this full and proper access to information? If there is a crisis situation and the information is shared on a platform that is algorithmically mediated, is it an effective way of communicating? Or should the government have its own channels of communication with citizens? 

- Which groups (government officials, political party leaders, civil society organizations) are the most active users of social media in your country? For whom has social media become a primary tool of communication?

J. Sz. - The politicians are definitely embracing the social media very heavily.

And we will be seeing lots of clipping tactics, or showing short videos from the parliamentary speeches in European parliaments, in the Polish parliament, that are very popular online and are gaining popularity in this way. The civil society is also using social media. In Poland, over the last decade, we had big social movements that were mediated mostly online.

I'm talking about big protests around reproductive rights. And they definitely use the online organizing to bring people out into the streets. So I would say that public discourse is very heavily driven by the use of online tools.

At the same time, we are seeing a bit of a muddy picture because there is so much artificial coordinated behavior online that it doesn't always give us a clear view of whether what you're seeing online from anonymous accounts is a viable political opinion expressed by a citizen, or whether it is something that was a coordinated effort, or whether it might be a bot network, or some other way of automated amplification.

-  How does your country experience Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference (FIMI) and other forms of public opinion manipulation in practice? What role do social networks play in these hybrid attacks and in efforts to counter them?

J. Sz. - This is relevant. Compared to other countries of the European Union, Poland is quite ahead when it comes to both experiencing and fighting FIMI. When it comes to experiencing it, I would say that over the last few years we have witnessed it a lot: lots of extremist ideas are being floated in low-value sources online, and then they are slowly moving to the mainstream of political debate. We are also seeing some voices being artificially amplified.

We are also seeing that the most engaging issues online, and we have data for this, are anti-EU climate misinformation, anti-LGBTQ, and anti-refugee narratives. And this is something that, honestly, I don't believe is reflected in society in day-to-day conversations, but this would be the reality when you look online. 

The FIMI attempts are even stronger when there is a crisis situation happening. Whether this is during elections, or in situations involving drones breaching the airspace over Poland, this is where we are seeing peaks of this type of coordinated attempts at disinformation.

When it comes to social media platforms and the AI chatbot platforms, we are seeing a bit of their activity when it comes to managing this. If you look, for example, at TikTok's website, you will see their monthly reports on how they manage the global threats like this. And you will see examples of thousands and even millions of likes or coordinated accounts being taken down by the platform itself.

If you have a look at the threat reports by the LLMs, the AI chatbot platforms, you will also see attempts of authoritarian countries to use these platforms to generate and automatically upload pictures, videos, memes. But this is still a drop in the ocean.

TikTok is doing a lot, and they are talking about this, but at the same time, they are being investigated by the European Commission around the Romanian election fiasco. So, definitely, there are lots of actions being taken both by the states, by the social media platforms, and by the users.

This video was produced with the financial support of the European Union and the German Marshall Fund of the United States Transatlantic Foundation (GMF TF). Its contents are the sole responsibility of the “Region” Research Center and do not necessarily reflect the views of the European Union or the GMF TF.