Disinformation Detours: Fast Fixes for Election Interference And Robocalls
Think of election interference as traffic accidents that interrupt voting.
Election interference can happen anywhere at any time, just like traffic accidents. Election interference take different forms – voter intimidation, robocalls, polling places shutdown… And unless quickly dealt with, interference can cause a lot of damage and delays. The people behind voter suppression know this and can target their mischief to create chaos.
How do you deal with widespread election interference? Just like WAZE does with traffic accidents. Have drivers report accidents and other driving hazards. Quickly analyze and map the info. Alert other drivers in the vicinity quickly so they can take a detour before they are caught up in a traffic jam.
See Say Now is such a crowdsourcing solution to deal with election interference and robocalls built on software from esri (a 50 year old company). Earlier versions of SeeSay were used in the 2018, 2020 and 2022 elections. See Say Now is a pilot project between Democracy Labs, Center For Common Ground, Free Speech For People, Black Voters Matter and VoteRiders. Learn more here.
Map of election interference incidents
Crowdsource data collection to quickly deal with election interference issues
See Say Now is designed like Waze. Anyone can use this link to report an election interference issue. Reports are timestamped and include the location of the incident. Voters can attach additional details as well as images and sound clips (of robocalls). The reports are immediately mapped and shared with election protection workers and other voters.
See Say Now does not require voters to install an app. It can be used from any smart phone and uses the GPS coordinates of the voter or the address they type in to map the incident. Volunteers screen the incoming submissions to filter out any crank incident reports.
The example shown here illustrates how voters in New Hampshire might report the incident of the fake robocall telling them to not vote. Try it out. Notice how easy it is to use and the reported incident being mapped immediately.
What is crowdsourcing?
Crowdsourcing brings together a large and group of people for gathering data or addressing a challenge. It typically occurs via digital platforms and smartphone apps for interaction and data collection. Crowdsourcing is based on the idea that a diverse group of participants can often achieve better results, more efficiently, than a small pool of contributors. – Brittanica
Dealing with AI generated election disinformation
See Something, Say Something was first launched in 2018 and has evolved as voter suppression and election interference become more rampant. AI generated election misinformation and robocalls threaten to make the problem worse making the need for a real time solution more urgent. Traditional approaches based on hotlines struggle to meet with these new threats because:
Hackers can clog up the phone line
It is hard to send images and sound clips about a voter suppression incident
Identifying patterns of localized voter suppression quickly is harder without a real-time map
It’s harder to prioritize urgent incidents (triage) and direct them to experts quickly
Information collected by See Say is saved and freely shared with voter protection groups to make it easier to analyze patterns in voter suppression.
Read more about See Something, Say Something
See Something, Say Something. Georgia.
Lincoln Project: See Something, Say Something (2020)!
SEE SOMETHING, SAY SOMETHING about voter intimidation (2020)
Map Reveals Voter Suppression Incidents in US Election (2019)
See Say 2018: Reporting Suspicious Happenings at Ballot Box (NBC)
Players of Samantha Bee’s mobile game have reported over 800 instances of voter suppression (The Verge)
See something. Say something. Especially at polling centers. (2018)
TakeAway: Fight voter suppression and AI generated election disinformation with crowdsourcing solutions like See Say Now.
Deepak
DemLabs
DISCLAIMER: ALTHOUGH THE DATA FOUND IN THIS BLOG AND INFOGRAPHIC HAS BEEN PRODUCED AND PROCESSED FROM SOURCES BELIEVED TO BE RELIABLE, NO WARRANTY EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED CAN BE MADE REGARDING THE ACCURACY, COMPLETENESS, LEGALITY OR RELIABILITY OF ANY SUCH INFORMATION. THIS DISCLAIMER APPLIES TO ANY USES OF THE INFORMATION WHETHER ISOLATED OR AGGREGATE USES THEREOF.
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Reposted from Democracy Labs with permission.
