We need electoral laws fit for the digital era
Facebook has taken steps to combat misinformation, but it’s for Parliament to set the rules of the game
The world over, election campaigns are now played out as much on social media as they are on the doorsteps, in our newspapers and on TV screens. From Austria to Tunisia, candidates, parties and voters have used Facebook and other platforms to make their voices heard in hundreds of elections this year. And it looks like a general election could soon be on its way in the UK, too.
We have learned the lessons of 2016 when Russia used Facebook to spread division and misinformation in the US Presidential election. Since then we have made big changes. We’ve built stronger defences to prevent people using our platforms to interfere with elections and we’re continuing to make improvements in several key areas.
First, removing fake accounts and reducing the spread of misinformation. As in other areas of life, cheats will commonly try to conceal their real identities, so we now identify and shut down millions of fake accounts every day. To strengthen our efforts to combat the spread of misinformation and viral hoaxes, here in the UK we now partner with Full Fact. Images and videos on Facebook, which they assess to be untrue, will now be more clearly labelled as false, and we’ll continue pointing people to reports that debunk the myth. Our algorithm also heavily demotes this content so it’s seen by fewer people and is far less likely to go viral.
Second, bringing more transparency to political adverts. Anybody who wants to run a political ad on our platforms in the UK must go through a verification process and provide ID documents to prove who they are and that they live here. Political ads are then labelled so you can see who has paid for them. We also put them into an Ad Library for seven years so that everyone can see what ads are running, what types of people saw them and how much was spent. From next week, all ads in the UK about social issues, such as immigration, health and the environment, will also have to go through this process.
Third, tackling hate speech and harassment of candidates. There is, rightly, a focus in the UK on the current tone of political debate. Hate speech and threats of violence have no place on our platforms, and we’re investing heavily to tackle it. More than 35,000 people now work on safety and security for Facebook, and our technology is helping us to automatically detect more of this harmful content. While there is further to go, the proportion of hate speech we remove before it’s reported to us has almost tripled over the last two years. We recently introduced a dedicated reporting channel for MPS to flag any abusive and threatening content directly to our teams, and this will be extended to all candidates when an election is called.
But while we are taking a number of steps, there are many areas where it’s simply not appropriate for a private company like Facebook to be setting the rules of the game or calling the shots. For instance, we do not believe it should be our role to fact check or judge the veracity of what politicians say – not least since political speech is heavily scrutinised by the media and our democratic processes.
We agree with the likes of the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport committee and the Information Commissioner’s Office that we need new rules for the era of digital campaigning. UK electoral law needs to be brought into the 21st century to give clarity to everyone – political parties, candidates and the platforms they use to promote their campaigns.
What constitutes a political ad? Should all online political advertising be recorded in a public archive, and should that extend to traditional platforms like billboards, direct mail and newspapers? Should anyone spending over a certain amount on political ads have to declare who their main funders are? Who, if anybody, should decide what politicians can and can’t say in their adverts? These are all questions that can only be properly decided by Parliament and regulators.
The law may not be changed before Britain goes to the polls again, but we are determined to play our part in protecting elections from interference. While we can never say for sure that there won’t be issues in future elections, we are confident that we’re better prepared than ever.