News and Research articles on World

To ban content that might possibly violate their own content policies, social media platforms use the term 'borderline‘. This means categorising content as potentially unwanted (e.g. harmful, inappropriate, etc) and sanctioning legitimate expressions of opinion - hence putting lawful speech in a twilight zone.

Going global: Comparing Chinese mobile applications’ data and user privacy governance at home and abroad

Lianrui Jia, University of Toronto
Lotus Ruan, University of Toronto
PUBLISHED ON: 16 Sep 2020 DOI: 10.14763/2020.3.1502

This paper examines data and privacy governance by four China-based mobile applications and their international versions - including the role of the state. It also highlights the role of platforms in gatekeeping mobile app privacy standards.

Since Twitter labelled a tweet by Donald Trump as ‘potentially misleading’ and indicated that it was fact-checking the statement made, the US President signed an ‘Executive Order'. Amélie Heldt finds that far from being new, the situation illustrates how torn we are when it comes to intermediary immunity or rather liability.

Voter preferences, voter manipulation, voter analytics: policy options for less surveillance and more autonomy

Jacquelyn Burkell, The University of Western Ontario
Priscilla M. Regan, George Mason University
PUBLISHED ON: 31 Dec 2019 DOI: 10.14763/2019.4.1438

Personalised political messaging undermines voter autonomy and the electoral process. Use of voter analytics for political communication must be regulated.

Discussing three factors that characterise the activities of political campaigners, this article demonstrates variations in who is using data in campaigns, what the sources of campaign data are, and how data informs communication.

WhatsApp and political instability in Brazil: targeted messages and political radicalisation

Rafael Evangelista, State University of Campinas (Unicamp)
Fernanda Bruno, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ)
PUBLISHED ON: 31 Dec 2019 DOI: 10.14763/2019.4.1434

This paper analyses the spread of misinformation in the context of 2018 Brazilian elections. We give a general overview of the Brazilian political context, its media ecosystem and the weaponisation of the country’s most popular messaging app, WhatsApp, as a political persuasion tool. The current architecture of the platform does not allow, once appropriated for purposes of election campaigns, users to notice or become aware that they are being monitored and managed.

Focusing on whether data-intensive technologies used in political campaigning are accurate and effective misses the point about their larger role in politics. This piece briefly addresses the popular question of “Does it work?” and suggests a series of questions and provocations that aim to more holistically capture the extent of tech-led disruption in a time of creeping voter surveillance.   

Platform transience: changes in Facebook’s policies, procedures, and affordances in global electoral politics

Bridget Barrett, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Daniel Kreiss, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
PUBLISHED ON: 31 Dec 2019 DOI: 10.14763/2019.4.1446

This paper shows how platforms are transient in the policies, procedures, and affordances and details the implications for politics.