- I spend all day looking at radicalization pathways
and the worst possible things that can happen online.
- In terms of tracking, my biggest concern this time
isn't Russian interference in the election,
it's American mobilizations at polling places,
threats of violence in terms of counting
or ballots or ballot boxes.
- Election security officials and academics
say misinformation and disinformation
have never been more of a threat to the U.S. election,
especially as coronavirus concerns
breed more confusion around the voting process.
From misleading text messages to false social media posts
shared by seemingly trusted sources,
bad actors are targeting many groups.
And often, the researchers tracking the content
find themselves scrambling to keep up
with those spreading the false or misleading information.
The researchers flag it to the platforms,
which also have their own monitoring services.
What's at stake for the 2020 presidential election?
What's the worst that could happen
if misinformation runs rampant?
- What are we opening ourselves up to?
How are we normalizing the ingestion
of information in quick, 10-slide Instagram Stories?
- [Emily] Isabella Garcia-Camargo
is a cybersecurity researcher at Stanford
working on a coalition focused on detecting
and mitigating misinformation
during the election.
- Even a year ago, a lot of people,
if you talked about QAnon, nobody really knew what it was.
Since COVID, though, and since the huge change
in kind of the information landscape
that came from that, the movement has really grown
over the past couple of months, and we're seeing it
pop up internationally even now.
- [Emily] The FBI has identified QAnon
as a potential domestic terrorism threat.
The far-right-wing, loosely organized network
is one of the conspiracy theory groups
that has gained traction since social distancing
forced many people to more frequently interact online.
And it's not just online platforms.
Misinformation is spreading more through text messages
or digital television ads, especially as social media firms
crack down on such content.
- [Isabella] I think it's important to recognize
that more and more young people are getting their news
from TikTok, getting their news from Instagram.
- People are isolated and they are trying
to figure out the world from a digital feed.
Well, if that digital feed is being manipulated
or bombarded with false information,
or being distorted through paid advertisements,
it makes it very difficult for people
to understand what's going on.
- [Emily] Clint Watts is a former FBI special agent
and a distinguished fellow
at the Foreign Policy Research Institute
studying social media influence.
Election security experts like Clint
say inaccurate voter or polling information
could mean some miss their chance to vote.
While social media giants like Facebook and Twitter
now have more stringent policies against content
that could suppress voters, security officials
are still worried about the damage done
before misinformation is labeled or removed.
Conspiracies that claim mail-in ballots
aren't counted could dissuade some voters,
and questions about the validity of election results
could threaten the future of politics in America.
- [Isabella] It's less one candidate
will have an unfair advantage or the other one will.
It's more like just generally mistrust in the outcome
from the losing side or from any side here.
If we start to erode the trust that we have
in our democratic principles and in our democratic system,
I think that that has very, very long-term consequences.
- [Clint] I want people to know that their vote counted,
and I want them to have confidence in that.
- [Emily] Misinformation has already spread
in this election cycle.
The legitimacy of mail-in ballots
has been questioned by some, and in August,
a number of Florida voters received
a spoofed text message alleging Rep. Byron Donalds
was dropping out of a congressional race.
Soon after, Donalds tweeted that the text message
shared false information, and he,
in fact, was not dropping out.
- If you continue to pump disinformation
through the social media machine
and social media doesn't regulate, to a degree,
what is actual verifiable truth, lets deepfakes continue,
those sorts of things, well, everyone loses in the end.
The companies fall into a collapsing state,
the politicians can't advance policy,
and voters are just sorta left hanging in the balance.
- Every single time that you post something
to your Story, that you like a tweet,
your interactions are like a vote in this space.
The most patriotic thing you can do
is to just think a little bit before you like,
or you tweet, or you share things.