Mozilla Research: Platforms’ Election Interventions in the Global Majority Are Ineffective

Mozilla Research Platforms' Election Interventions in the Global Majority Are Ineffective

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Mozilla has released a series of election-related research that examines 200+ interventions by Meta, Google, and others deployed across seven years and 27 countries. The study reveals troubling patterns about what, where, and why these initiatives are deployed.

One of the reports published by Mozilla's Open Source Research and Investigations team is 'Platforms, Promises and Politics A Reality Check on the Pledges Platforms Make before Elections.' This report scrutinizes election policies announced by Meta, TikTok, YouTube, and X in various regions and reveals that the majority of interventions have been aimed at content moderation strategies.

The study found that the top three election intervention platforms announced were digital literacy programs (23 countries), fact-checking initiatives (21 countries), and content moderation policy updates (21 countries). While the interventions in the U.S. and Europe focused mainly on political advertising, policies across the Global Majority have been aimed at content moderation strategies.

The report also notes that platforms have played an outsized role in amplifying disinformation, often with devastating consequences in the Global South. Now, as AI-generated content proliferates online, they are also finding their paths into our democracies. AI-generated deepfakes appear to be swaying political ideologies and charming voters while eroding trust in voting institutions.

Meanwhile, as platforms catch up to contain AI deepfake menace, systemic policy changes are barely catching up in Global Majority countries. The research found that most platforms are likely to take action in Global Majority countries if those elections happen to align with the U.S., which paves the way for vulnerable windows to be exploited.

The study also observed that election-related interventions in Kenya, Nigeria, and Ethiopia had deep similarities, as though copied from a template, despite each of these African countries having unique socio-political contexts. Devastatingly this practice appears to be common. Brazilian researchers also noted a careless "copy-paste" approach between the TikTok policies announced in the U.S. and those in Brazil, ahead of the 2022 Brazilian elections.

The report reveals that platforms' sloppiness in rolling out effective policies marks the pinnacle of disregard for democracy in Global Majority countries. The skewed allocation of resources is not accidental but a brazen display of self-serving tactics, highlighting a reprehensible indifference to global democratic stability in favor of regions where their bottom line might be threatened by regulatory backlash.

The Mozilla research also highlights the role of messaging apps like WhatsApp and Telegram in supercharging election misinformation yet the platform's operation is met by limited oversight. The casebook will be expanded to include other countries’ elections over the coming year.