Artificial intelligence is opening up new possibilities for generating, disseminating, and manipulating information. This development has profound consequences, particularly for the ability to make informed decisions and for the fair conduct of democratic elections.
As part of the cross-border project “Media and Me – Backstage bei Medienberufen,” eleven young participants had the opportunity to discover the behind-the-scenes work at ALIA and reflect on the challenges associated with this development.
From impressive deepfakes, capable of making politicians say anything, to simpler cheapfakes based on misleading image excerpts or manipulated subtitles, AI offers a wide range of means to influence opinions or sow doubt.
Automated bots and fake accounts spread this content on a large scale, reinforce extremist discourse, and give the illusion that certain opinions are more widely held than they really are.
In addition, social media recommendation algorithms determine which content is highlighted, giving priority to content that elicits strong emotions or polarizes debate.
In addition, there are virtual influencers: artificially generated characters designed to elicit sympathy and subtly spread political messages, often hidden in entertainment content.
All of these phenomena represent a major challenge to the formation of informed opinion, a fundamental pillar of any democratic society. If citizens can no longer trust the veracity of information, it becomes difficult to engage in calm debate based on a common set of facts.
In this context, several questions arise: How can we guarantee plurality of viewpoints in information in the future? What transparency rules are needed? And what responsibilities should AI developers and users assume?
