In 2024, an unprecedented challenge will face democracy. The four largest democratic blocs in the world – India, the European Union, the United States and Indonesia – will all hold general elections in the same year, for the first time in the age of the internet. Nearly a billion people may cast their votes, with the process taking place amidst a deluge of disinformation and digital manipulation like never before.
The outcome of these elections will have profound implications for the future of democracy itself. In the US, the leading candidate seems to be enthusiastic about the prospect of assuming the role of a dictator. In the EU, the far right is positioned to gain significant ground across the continent. Meanwhile, Indonesia’s front-runner is a former general who has faced accusations of human rights violations. In India, an embattled opposition is facing its final opportunity to prevent what could become years of one-party rule.
It has been evident since at least 2016 that elections in the digital age are particularly vulnerable to manipulation. While efforts have been made by responsible officials to safeguard the integrity of elections, it is clear that they are battling the previous battle. Former US President Donald Trump’s victory in 2016 and other similar events were influenced by deliberately planted narratives and bot farms. In response, a multitude of fact-checkers emerged globally and measures to prevent the spread of “fake news” within formal media outlets expanded.
The experience of India, which boasts the largest number of voters and as a result is the world’s biggest testing ground for election malpractice, demonstrates the shortcomings in these efforts. The more vigilant fact-checkers are, the easier it becomes for them to be overwhelmed by a flood of fake news. Moreover, human fact-checkers are susceptible to being discredited, regardless of the fairness of such discrediting.
New ideas have begun to emerge in response. Even critics of Elon Musk have expressed appreciation for the “community notes” he has introduced to X, previously known as Twitter, which label viral tweets with fact-checks sourced from the crowd. These crowd-sourced notes adapt to the volume of fake news in circulation and are more challenging to dismiss as biased since they are not linked to any specific group of fact-checkers.
However, advancements in technology have outpaced these efforts. AI-based disinformation has already started to spread and becomes increasingly difficult to discern as fake with each passing month. Interestingly, preventing such messages from going viral is more difficult when they do not appear immediately as offensive or particularly pointed. For example, in Indonesia, a TikTok video that seemingly depicted the country’s defense minister and presidential candidate, Prabowo Subianto, speaking in Arabic, was viewed millions of times. In reality, it was an AI-generated deepfake aimed at bolstering his diplomatic and potentially Islamic credentials.
Furthermore, it cannot be assumed that an electorate that is becoming more digitally adept will be capable of navigating this new information landscape unaided. A lesson from the information war accompanying Israel’s conflict with Hamas in Gaza is that individuals who have grown up with the internet are not the best equipped to identify obvious propaganda. In fact, they appear to be the least capable of differentiating between fact and fiction.
The threat to democracy is transnational, as the platforms being utilized are global, as is the message being conveyed. Consequently, its defense cannot be confined to national boundaries. Moreover, no single government can handle this task alone, nor can any government be trusted to pursue it independently.
Each country has different approaches to securing its elections, and both those attempting to manipulate the process and the platforms they exploit have capitalized on this lack of unity. Without a more coordinated and strategic approach, the deluge of disinformation expected in the coming year will overwhelm individual defenses.
The most effective mechanisms – whether crowd-sourcing, transnational regulation of platforms, or shared norms on speech and de-platforming – are unknown at present. However, swift information-sharing on effective measures and unified pressure on platforms to adopt them will be crucial.
We can draw lessons from each other – for instance, India’s ban on TikTok seems to have been more successful than anticipated. But a commitment to transparency must also be shared. Regulators in India and Indonesia need to be convinced that the online norms of platforms based in the US are just as focused on preserving national unity and political integrity as they are on defending the speech conventions of northern California.
Ultimately, international cooperation is crucial. The defense of democracy has always been a key rationale for multilateral action, and in 2024, this defense needs to encompass the protection of our national elections. – Bloomberg
Mihir Sharma is the author of ‘Restart: The Last Chance for the Indian Economy’ and a senior fellow at the Observer Research Foundation in New Delhi.
