Organizations that combat political
misinformation cried foul.
“It was misleading and it was inappropriate,” Will
Moy, chief executive of the London-based fact-
checking website Full Fact, told The Associated
Press. “It’s not what we can see a serious political
party doing.’’
Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab defended the
party’s actions, saying the Twitter account was
clearly linked to the Conservatives and asserting
that voters would not be perturbed by “the
social media cut and thrust.”
“We make no apology for having an instant
rebuttal to all the nonsense and lies put out,”
Raab told the BBC.
Twitter said in a statement that it had “global
rules in place that prohibit behavior that can
mislead people.” The company pledged to take
“decisive corrective action” if there were any
more attempts “to mislead people by editing
verified profile information,” but did not censure
the Tories for their account switch.
The manipulation of the account during a high-
profile event put the rise of digital campaigning
squarely in the public eye. All political parties
are devoting much of their campaign spending
to the digital realm as they battle to win the
U.K.’s Dec. 12 election, bypassing strict laws that
govern communication on radio and television.
Despite parliamentary reports urging new
regulations to combat misinformation or
regulate the way digital ads target voters, British
officials have made no significant changes to
laws governing online ads, social media and
election disinformation.