The Division “Center for Information and Communication Technologies & Society (ICT&S)” deals with current processes of digital transformation of society. In this context, phenomena on the level of individual interaction with digital technologies as well as questions that arise on the societal level are taken into account.

Currently, the ICT&S-Center is participating in a research program, “Digital Humanities”, with a project DEGENT that deals with the questions of conspiracy theories and their possible dangers for democracy. The project has transdisciplinary cooperation with the Department of Geoinformatics to find relevant network structures of the online counter public in Social Media. Insights into the DEGENET project including initial results can be found here: DEGENET

Another research project focuses on the topic of digital skills. The project is funded by the Austrian Media and Telecom Regulation Authority RTR and tries to find representative data about digital skills in Austria and their implications for digital participation in society. Furthermore, research is conducted on the level of PhD projects and the level of habilitation projects.

Furthermore, the Center for ICT&S is hosting the Doctoral School “Digital Society and Democracy” as an interdisciplinary cooperation between the Department of Sociology, Political Science and Communication Science. And on the level of teaching, the Unit is engaged in the BA- and MA-program of the Department and in the BA-program BA_DIG, Digitalization -Innovation-Society. The Open Access Journal “kommunikation.medien” is also produced under the leadership of the ICT&S Center.