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A television series can convince millions of people that a drug works in a certain way. A historical novel can distort an entire community's collective memory of a conflict. TrueStories is the project that aims to give technology the ability to detect when this happens — and why.

The project, question by question

The best way to introduce TrueStories is to go straight to the essential questions: who, what, when, where and why.

What?

TrueStories is a research and innovation project developing an AI-based tool capable of detecting, classifying and helping to mitigate disinformation present in works of fiction — series, films, novels and other narrative content. The tool analyses the text or script of a work, extracts factual claims and cross-references them against a verified knowledge base to determine whether they are accurate or misleading.

Who?

The project is a collaboration between the University of Salamanca, one of Spain's leading centres for artificial intelligence and natural language processing, and EUROSTAR MEDIAGROUP, a company in the audiovisual sector. The research team is led by Professor Javier Prieto Tejedor of the University of Salamanca. Funding comes from the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities (MICIU/AEI) and the European Union through the NextGenerationEU/PRTR programme.

When?

The project launched in October 2022 and is scheduled for completion in September 2025, with a total duration of three years. It is part of the 2021 Public-Private Collaboration Projects call under the Spanish State Plan for Scientific, Technical and Innovation Research 2021-2023. Official reference number: CPP2021-008358.

Where?

The research is conducted primarily in Salamanca, at the University of Salamanca, an institution with over 800 years of history and a prominent position in technological research. The project has national and international reach: European funding and the involvement of an industrial partner active in the audiovisual sector give it scope well beyond the regional level. It is listed in the TCUE Plan 2021-2023 of the Regional Government of Castile and Leon, which tracks university-business technology transfer in the region.

Why?

Disinformation in works of fiction is a real, persistent and difficult-to-combat phenomenon. Unlike fake news, fictional content is consumed with the audience's guard down: viewers and readers suspend their disbelief to enjoy the story, making them more receptive to inaccurate messages about science, history, medicine or society. Existing fact-checking mechanisms do not cover this type of content, and the sheer volume of audiovisual and literary production makes systematic manual review impossible. TrueStories fills that gap with technology.

What does the name mean?

The project name is both an evocative title and a carefully constructed English acronym: TRUstworthy artificial intElligence over NPL to fight againST disinfORmation InstrumEnts in fiction.

The choice is deliberate. "TrueStories" reflects the project's ambition: not to eliminate fiction or constrain narrative creativity, but to give us the tools to know when a story departs from reality in a significant way.

How does it work, in essence?

The tool TrueStories is developing combines three major technological components:

1.  Reliable information extraction. The system aggregates and weights data from multiple verified sources to build a robust knowledge base against which claims can be checked.

2.  Certified ontologies. That knowledge base is organised into formal structures — ontologies — whose integrity is guaranteed through distributed ledger technology (DLT), making any modification fully auditable.

3.  Natural language processing. NLP algorithms analyse the text of the fictional work, extract factual claims, cross-reference them against the ontology and classify the results: is the information incorrect? And if so, was it introduced deliberately or accidentally?

The output is a report that identifies where potentially misleading information appears, how confident the system is in each assessment, and what type of disinformation it represents. Such a tool can be integrated into the production workflows of studios, publishers or distribution platforms.

Who is the tool for?

TrueStories has a dual dimension of impact. On one hand, the audiovisual and publishing industry: production companies, screenwriters, editors and distribution platforms that want to incorporate a layer of factual verification into their content creation and review processes. The involvement of EUROSTAR MEDIAGROUP ensures that the development responds to real-world industry needs.

On the other hand, the project has a broader social impact. In a media environment where the boundary between information and entertainment is increasingly blurred, having tools that audit the factual accuracy of fictional content contributes to a more transparent information ecosystem and a citizenry better equipped to understand what it consumes.

TrueStories does not aim to tell anyone what they can or cannot say. It aims to give us the rigour and the technology to know when what we are told strays from the truth.

Project information

Reference: CPP2021-008358  ·  PI: Javier Prieto Tejedor  ·  University of Salamanca

Funded by MICIU/AEI and the European Union NextGenerationEU/PRTR