US isn’t the only country with an election interference problem
0US isn’t the only country with an election interference problem.
Voters in 18 nations were influenced by online trolls, propaganda and disinformation campaigns originating from different sources in the last year, according to a new study.
According to research carried out by Freedom House, democratic integrity has only deteriorated in the past seven years, and as of June 2016 the countries most affected were Ukraine, Egypt, and Turkey. The assessment was carried out in 65 countries, which make up 87 percent of the world’s internet usage — showing questionable election results go far beyond fake news in the US.
This means that voters were influenced by erroneous information regarding opposing candidates as well as bots and trolls. “Governments in a total of 30 countries deployed some form of manipulation to distort online information, up from 23 the previous year,” Freedom House reports, indicating that there wasn’t just manipulation from other countries, as seen with Russia in the US 2016 elections, but from local governments intervening to assure a victory in upcoming elections.