Such rifts often serve the interests of antidemocratic forces in society, the government, or hostile foreign states, which have actively encouraged them through content manipulation.Īs democratic societies struggle with the challenges of a more dangerous and contested online sphere, leaders in Beijing have stepped up efforts to use digital media to increase their own power, both at home and abroad. Over the past 12 months in Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka, and Myanmar, false rumors and hateful propaganda that were spread online incited jarring outbreaks of violence against ethnic and religious minorities. With or without malign intent, the internet and social media in particular can push citizens into polarized echo chambers and pull at the social fabric of a country, fueling hostility between different communities. Russian hackers targeted US voter rolls in several states as part of the Kremlin’s broader efforts to undermine the integrity of the 2016 elections, and since then, security researchers have discovered further breaches of data affecting 198 million American, 93 million Mexican, 55 million Filipino, and 50 million Turkish voters. The case was a reminder of how personal information is increasingly being employed to influence electoral outcomes. In April 2018, Facebook founder and chief executive Mark Zuckerberg testified in two congressional hearings about his company’s role in the Cambridge Analytica scandal, in which it was revealed that Facebook had exposed the data of up to 87 million users to political exploitation. As a result of these trends, global internet freedom declined for the eighth consecutive year in 2018.Įvents this year have confirmed that the internet can be used to disrupt democracies as surely as it can destabilize dictatorships. And a cohort of countries is moving toward digital authoritarianism by embracing the Chinese model of extensive censorship and automated surveillance systems. The unbridled collection of personal data has broken down traditional notions of privacy. ![]() The internet is growing less free around the world, and democracy itself is withering under its influence.ĭisinformation and propaganda disseminated online have poisoned the public sphere. Emergency Assistance and Thematic Programs.Afghanistan Human Rights Coordination Mechanism.Government Accountability & Transparency.
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