Warren, Lujan, Lawmakers Push Social Media Platforms to Combat 2024 Election Disinformation
Foreign and domestic bad actors are actively targeting Americans with election disinformation to mislead voters and suppress turnout
Washington, D.C. — Senior Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) joined Senator Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.) along with Senator Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), Senator Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), and Senator Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), in urging 11 of the biggest social media and encrypted chat companies in the United States to increase resources to combat rampant disinformation online.
During the 2020 and 2022 U.S. federal elections, foreign adversaries supported the creation and targeting of election disinformation to undermine our democracy. This disinformation included false information on voter eligibility requirements, the timing and location of voting, the ballot counting process, and the certification process.
A recent 2024 report noted that China, Iran, and Russia have started ramping up election influence operations using tactics including AI, use of trusted labels or logos atop false information, digital manipulations, and mischaracterization of content.
“We are deeply concerned that the dissemination of election disinformation via your products and/or platforms—if left unmitigated—will suppress voter participation, sow doubt in U.S. democracy and incite political violence,” wrote the Senators. “Considering the increase in election disinformation on digital platforms during recent elections, there is ample cause for concern.”
The Senators urged Meta, Google (YouTube), TikTok, X (Twitter), Reddit, Snapchat, Amazon (Twitch), Discord, Signal, Telegram, and Apple (Messages) to:
- Provide information, broken down by language, about the size and capacity of their 2024 U.S. elections safety resources, including personnel and technologies;
- Commit to increasing their 2024 U.S. election safety team and technology resourcing for the 10 most commonly spoken languages on their platform(s);
- Share information about how they plan to de-amplify and/or remove election disinformation (whether created using AI or not) and/or user accounts who spread this disinformation when in violation of their policies;
- For encrypted chat providers, explain whether they have a reporting system for their users to flag unwanted election disinformation and what enforcement measures are in place;
- Share their plans for amplifying official election information before, during, and after the 2024 U.S. elections.
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