Sofia Bulgaria March 5th 2026
Project website: https://media-ownership.eu
Registration for webinar: https://media-ownership.eu/registration-for-webinar/
Who owns Europe’s media? EurOMo puts more than 700 media outlets and their real controllers on the map — now searchable as a network
A new edition of the Euromedia Ownership Monitor (EurOMo) is live with a redesigned search engine that lets journalists, regulators and the public trace media ownership and control across borders — including beneficial/ultimate owners and key decision-makers such as CEOs and editors-in-chief. Public webinar in March introduces new features.
EurOMo published an expanded database covering around hundreds of opinion-shaping media outlets across all EU countries with data from 2025. The database includes more than 700 media outlets, 4,300 people (owners and other controlling actors) and 2,100 organisations with stakes in these outlets. Users can explore results visually as a network map, filter by control relations beyond legal shareholding, and download data in a machine-readable format aligned with an open standard (BODS v0.3).
Whereas the full version is available to registered users with legitimate interest (journalists, policymakers, members of civil society organisations), the public version can be freely used by any citizen on the project’s website. In addition to the database, all users can read reports that focus on the specific situation of each country and compare risks between countries across dozens of indicators.
To introduce the latest version and all new features, a public webinar will be held in March in two sessions:
- Friday, 20 March 2026, 11:00 CET/12:00 EET
- Monday, 23 March 2026, 15:00 CET/16:00 EET
Any interested person can register for one of the sessions via the project’s website: https://media-ownership.eu/registration-for-webinar/.
The project has been funded by the European Commission since 2021, with the goal to strengthen media transparency and trust in democratic institutions.
In a nutshell, what’s new in EurOMo
- A new network-based search engine: search results appear as a network, making connections and control pathways easier to spot.
- Ultimate/beneficial owners highlighted by default: the standard view surfaces the “last link in the chain” to help identify who ultimately controls outlets and media companies.
- Control beyond shareholding: users can explore other relationships that shape control (not only legal equity stakes).
- Machine-readable, reusable data: available for download in a structured format aligned with BODS v0.3.
- Updated risk assessments + country reports: each country includes narrative reporting and an assessment of risks to transparency across multiple dimensions.
The EuroOMo 2025 Bulgaria report, prepared by experts of the “Media 21” Foundation, finds that:
• The media environment in Bulgaria operates at the intersection of weak institutions, a lack of political will for reforms and economic dependencies that are difficult to uncover. The implementation of the European Media Freedom Act (EMFA) has been significantly delayed with the resulting negative consequences.
• Registers provide information, but the overall picture requires a lot of time and effort. The shareholding of the beneficial owners and especially the disclosure of the individual beneficial owner cannot always be disclosed. This is most true for companies registered outside Bulgaria, when the chain of shareholders turns out to be very complex.
• Most media provide outdated financial information (2022–2023).
• Disclosure of public revenues and revenues from third-party advertising is in most cases unclear, as there is no clear division by type of media or distinction between public and third-party advertising. Exceptions to some extent, are BNT and BNR, as well as several media outlets that do not declare any advertising revenues at all. Given these circumstances, it is not possible to make a clear assessment of the scale of the impact of public/state and foreign (non-EU) advertising revenues for the media or their owners.
• Improving the existing registers through better synchronization is mandatory, and the most adequate legal response would be the creation of a new, unified media register at the national regulator – CEM – in accordance with the requirement of Art. 6 of the European Freedom of the Media Act.
The report and its data are available at: https://media-ownership.eu/2025-edition/country-reports/bulgaria/
Contacts:
Contact for Bulgaria:
Name: Dr. Bissera Zankova
Organization: Media 21 Foundation
Email: bzankova@gmail.com | Phone: 00359888832013
Coordination (EurOMo):
Name: Tales Tomaz (Assistant Professor, Dept. of Communication Studies)
Organisation: University of Salzburg
Email: tales.tomaz@plus.ac.at | Phone: +43 662 8044 4195
Name: Josef Trappel (Full Professor, Dept. of Communication Studies)
Organisation: University of Salzburg
Email: josef.trappel@plus.ac.at | Phone: +43 662 8044 4167