To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to protect upcoming UK elections from being influenced by AI-driven content.
Answered on
14 July 2023
It is, and will always be, an absolute priority to protect our democratic and electoral processes. The Department for Science, Innovation and Technology's Counter Disinformation Unit responds to periods of acute disinformation risk, including UK elections. The Unit does this by identifying harmful false narratives and working closely with the major social media platforms to encourage them to swiftly remove disinformation and coordinated inauthentic or manipulated behaviour, as per their Terms of Service.
The Elections Act 2022 introduced one of the most comprehensive 'digital imprint' regimes that operates in the word today. This new regime, once commenced, will increase the transparency of digital political campaigning; empowering citizens to make informed decisions on who is promoting political material online and on whose behalf.