electoral laws, which it said weren’t “fit for
purpose” in the 21st century. The report followed
an 18-month inquiry into fake news and data
manipulation by political campaigns, which
was triggered by concerns about Russian
interference in western elections. The probe
helped fuel a scandal about how consultancy
Cambridge Analytica used Facebook data to
target voters during Donald Trump’s 2016 run
for the White House.
The government’s failure to act on the
committee’s recommendations leaves voters at
the mercy of unscrupulous campaign operatives
at a time when more and more people are
turning to social media for news and information.
Since there are no sanctions for misbehavior
- other than having your post removed from
Twitter, Facebook or Google - the campaigns
have realized there’s little downside to posting
doctored videos or misleading information.
“You aren’t seeing any blowback from that. It’s
almost the opposite,’’ said Zvika Krieger, head of
technology policy at the World Economic Forum.
“(Being misleading) gets more attention. There’s
a perverse incentive to post as much misleading
information as possible. It’s a very worrying trend.’’
While misinformation is not new in political
campaigns, digital data is improving
exponentially political campaigns’ ability
to tailor messages to voters based on their
behavior online. And this comes at a time
when parties are devoting more resources to
digital communications.
The Conservatives spent 3.98 million pounds
($5.17 million) on social media and data-driven
advertising during the last general election