The danger of social media being abused to hack democracy was rising and the government should put an end to the “systematic interference” of Facebook and other social media giants in electoral politics of the world’s largest democracy, Congress president Sonia Gandhi said on Wednesday.
Raising the issue during the Zero Hour in the Lok Sabha, Ms. Gandhi stated that global companies like Facebook and Twitter were increasingly used “to shape political narratives by leaders, political parties and their proxies”.
She noted that social media companies were not providing a level playing field to all political parties and referred to the investigation done by The Wall Street Journal last year in which it was claimed that Facebook bent its own rules on hate speech to favour politicians of the ruling party.
‘Toxic ecosystem’
“Recently, Al Jazeera and the Reporter’s Collective have demonstrated how a toxic ecosystem of proxy advertisers posing as news media is flourishing on Facebook, bypassing election laws of our nation, breaking Facebook’s own rules, and completely suppressing the voice of those who are speaking up against the government,” she observed.
Facebook, with the connivance of the ruling establishment, was filling “young and old mind with hate through emotionally charged disinformation and proxy advertising,” she alleged.
“These reports show a growing nexus between big corporations, the ruling establishment and global social media giants like Facebook….I urge the government to put an end to this systematic influence and interference of Facebook and other social media giants in the electoral politics of the world’s largest democracy. This is beyond partisan politics. We need to protect our democracy and social harmony regardless of who is in power,” she added.
Charge against Congress
BJP member Nishikant Dubey, speaking soon after her, accused the Congress of trying to suppress freedom of speech by bringing in Section 66A in the Information Technology Act. “It is still not decided whether Facebook and Twitter are considered as publisher or intermediary. Today when Yasin Malik, who has killed officers of the Indian Air Force, is seen with Manmohan Singh in a photo, there is an attempt to suppress it,” he said.
He urged Speaker Om Birla to set up a committee to examine and present a white paper on how freedom of expression was curbed during the Congress rule.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, who recently complained to the micro-blogging site of blocking his supporters, shared a screenshot of the Al Jazeera-The Reporter’s Collective that claimed “a Reliance-funded firm boosted BJP’s campaign on Facebook”. “Meta-worse for democracy,” he tweeted.
