Session
Over the course of 2024, we have experienced the biggest elections megacycle in recent history. Among many other notable elements, some societies - namely the ones based in the global majority - have experienced growing cases of tech harms.
The Internet plays a crucial role in supporting citizens during elections, for example by providing access to information and enabling them to form opinions. However, the open and free nature of the Internet also exposes vulnerabilities and threats that can interfere with electoral processes, potentially causing harm.
The spread of misinformation and disinformation, hate speech, gender-based violence, attacks on information integrity and other violations of human rights, are examples of these vulnerabilities and threats. On top of the current challenges, a series of tech layoffs and setbacks in platform policies all over the world - such as the closing of tools like Crowdtangle - might have established new barriers to access to information and election monitoring.
The broader internet governance debate often intersects with Electoral and Information debates when we introduce conversations regarding political and fundamental rights such as access to information and freedom of expression, need for improved empowerment of voters, improved data governance frameworks and joint election monitoring efforts between stakeholders like Governments, academia and civil society.
This session will therefore foster a discussion on the role of stakeholders in protecting information and electoral integrity, what rights are at risk of being harmed by state and private actors before, during or after elections and what sort of policy-related solution sets could be offered through multistakeholder cooperation in order to help protect information integrity in elections. It will present existing initiatives and efforts, and address the challenges and opportunities to strengthen international cooperation in this area. The goal is to explore how we can leverage the internet to support informed citizen participation in elections, while mitigating the risks to electoral integrity.