News Forum - Is TikTok disinformation threatening ‘democracy’ in Thailand?

[Thaiger]

Especially at voting time, fears grow of TikTok ‘disinformation’ threatening democracy. Politicians and their paymasters are terrified that they can no longer to control the supply of information to the public, thanks to platforms like Facebook and TikTok. With Thailand’s general election only a few months away,  the Election Commission of Thailand (ECT) is battling …

The story Is TikTok disinformation threatening ‘democracy’ in Thailand? as seen on Thaiger News.

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[KaptainRob]

Quote

TikTok does for information what Pringles and Coke do for nutrition.

Never a truer phrase written! 

[Soidog]

Is TikTok disinformation threatening ‘democracy’ in Thailand?

Not unless the Thai military now call themselves TikTok? I don’t recall TikTok rolling out armoured vehicles on the streets of Bangkok and ripping up the constitution. 

[BillO]

Huh! And I thought Tik Tok was only for insecure women seeking male affirmation and attention by stripping down to their underwear. Who knew? 

[JohninDublin]

49 minutes ago, Soidog said:

Is TikTok disinformation threatening ‘democracy’ in Thailand?

Not unless the Thai military now call themselves TikTok? I don’t recall TikTok rolling out armoured vehicles on the streets of Bangkok and ripping up the constitution. 

Disinformation is invariably a threat to democracy. Recent glaring examples, Brexit Vote, 2016 and 2020 US elections. 

[JohninDublin]

Reading through the article itself, I find this to be a very worrying development. A true Trojan Horse which far too many have welcomed into their personal domains.

I used to think that the greatest threat to democracy if you live in a liberal democracy, was attacks on freedom of speech. But that was based on the notion that most participants were acting in good faith, and if (eg), someone was trying to racial unrest from a street corner pulpit, it was usually easy to expose his claims by debate. The problem is that you Social Media Platforms are the new street corner pulpits of the demagogues. Demagogues rarely act in good faith.

Reading that TikTok removed over 9 million posts in two months related to the Phils elections, was also concerning. That's close to 2 posts every second of the day in that period. I am guessing that the moderators will take several minutes in considering if a post needs to be actioned. If there was objective criteria to the policy, then you have to conclude that TikTok dedicated hundreds of moderators to this task 24/7. Or maybe TikTok operated a bias in favour of one candidate. 

That is an appalling idea, that Facebook, Tiktok etc biases and agendas may be deciding factor in future elections. 

[Grumpish]

22 minutes ago, JohninDublin said:

I used to think that the greatest threat to democracy if you live in a liberal democracy, was attacks on freedom of speech. But that was based on the notion that most participants were acting in good faith, and if (eg), someone was trying to racial unrest from a street corner pulpit, it was usually easy to expose his claims by debate. The problem is that you Social Media Platforms are the new street corner pulpits of the demagogues. Demagogues rarely act in good faith.

I agree with that sentiment  - however I do wonder if allowing the vote for people that regard the likes of Tik Tok and Facebook as sources of actual information is actually the greater threat to democracy.

Hint  - the preceding statement may have contained traces of sarcasm.

[KaptainRob]

52 minutes ago, JohninDublin said:

That is an appalling idea, that Facebook, Tiktok etc biases and agendas may be deciding factor in future elections. 

TikTok is CCP controlled so surely their 'moderation' is totally unbiased  

[Soidog]

2 hours ago, JohninDublin said:

Disinformation is invariably a threat to democracy. Recent glaring examples, Brexit Vote, 2016 and 2020 US elections. 

But that’s not the key threat in Thailand which is what the article is about. Of course democracy is always under threat  even in developed democracies. But Thailand has much more tangible issues 

[TheDirtyDurian]

1 hour ago, JohninDublin said:

Reading through the article itself, I find this to be a very worrying development. A true Trojan Horse which far too many have welcomed into their personal domains.

I used to think that the greatest threat to democracy if you live in a liberal democracy, was attacks on freedom of speech. But that was based on the notion that most participants were acting in good faith, and if (eg), someone was trying to racial unrest from a street corner pulpit, it was usually easy to expose his claims by debate. The problem is that you Social Media Platforms are the new street corner pulpits of the demagogues. Demagogues rarely act in good faith.

Reading that TikTok removed over 9 million posts in two months related to the Phils elections, was also concerning. That's close to 2 posts every second of the day in that period. I am guessing that the moderators will take several minutes in considering if a post needs to be actioned. If there was objective criteria to the policy, then you have to conclude that TikTok dedicated hundreds of moderators to this task 24/7. Or maybe TikTok operated a bias in favour of one candidate. 

That is an appalling idea, that Facebook, Tiktok etc biases and agendas may be deciding factor in future elections. 

Most media have some kind of bias, just look at newspapers in the uk, gbnews, fox news etc

"it was the Sun wot won it" and so on... 

They're all going to put some kind of spin on elections 

Are voting intentions so capricious they'll be dependent on a tiktok video? I dunno. 

[JohninDublin]

6 hours ago, KaptainRob said:

TikTok is CCP controlled so surely their 'moderation' is totally unbiased  

I recall when Huawei were being considered as a possible threat to National Security in both the US and the Uk, and the company boss stating that the CCP cannot tell them what to do, and that they were totally independent of the Chinese gov. Well of course, why would I disbelieve that?

[JohninDublin]

6 hours ago, Soidog said:

But that’s not the key threat in Thailand which is what the article is about. Of course democracy is always under threat  even in developed democracies. But Thailand has much more tangible issues 

That was not the implication I got from your post.

[JohninDublin]

6 hours ago, TheDirtyDurian said:

Most media have some kind of bias, just look at newspapers in the uk, gbnews, fox news etc

"it was the Sun wot won it" and so on... 

They're all going to put some kind of spin on elections 

Are voting intentions so capricious they'll be dependent on a tiktok video? I dunno. 

This needs a fuller reply, and I am just going out for my night's entertainment. But @KaptainRobwas in the right direction with talk of CCP input.

[Chatogaster]

10 hours ago, Thaiger said:

The US and European Union have banned TikTok from the phones of government employees – much as China has long since banned Zuckerberg’s Metaverse and Google’s information engine.

 

This entire article is a highly fluffed up version of a remotely sourced article as is the modus operandi of some authors (NikkeiAisia is one of the likely prime sources in this case). It's not the copying I mind, but the extent of the fluff that gets injected in-between the actual facts to make it a Thaigeresque article. That fluff is sometimes hard to spot and all the more dangerous if its credibility is intended to be subconsciously boosted by the surrounding "real" facts.

Take the quoted fluffy bit above as an example (there are many more, but that one is a prime example). Many people would take that statement for granted and interpret it as a sort of equivalence between comparable parts. Yet it'd be a false comparison (turning the statement into disinformation, which could be a form of self-irony since the article is about disinformation). To counter-act with some actual facts to give the proper perspective:

• US/EU: TikTok is not allowed on official devices of government employees out of fear of sensitive information leaking out of governments. Whatever those individuals choose to do on their private phones (the ones not used for government business) is up to them. The entire population (including government officials) is free access TikTok.
• CH: Google [Search] has been blocked (since 2010) for all phones of all individuals out of fear of sensitive information leaking into the minds of individuals. The entire population is unable to access Google via regular routing.

PS: Metaverse is not banned in CH, and even if some curtails could be called a ban, that could never have happened "long since" (how could it be if the idea has barely left the cradle?).

PPS: the essence of this article (i.e., ignoring the fluffy, sensationalistic rewritten and ultimately tainted  parts) is important, topical and hence news-worthy. Why de-value that essence?

 

[Soidog]

5 hours ago, JohninDublin said:

That was not the implication I got from your post.

Sorry I’m confused now!
 

To be clear. TikTok being a problem fades in to insignificance compared to the military in Thailand. If you are Thai, forget TikTok being a problem. Think more about what your military will do to your faux democracy. 

[HiuMak]

TikTok is as evil as Whatsapp.

[Skip]

There is no truth in politics...

[JohninDublin]

8 hours ago, Soidog said:

Sorry I’m confused now!
 

To be clear. TikTok being a problem fades in to insignificance compared to the military in Thailand. If you are Thai, forget TikTok being a problem. Think more about what your military will do to your faux democracy. 

Force becomes a last resort. If the Military are going to stage a coup, it will only be if they don't like the result of an election. The danger in the interim is that orgs like TikTok, can skew the election results so that a coup becomes unnecessary.

[Soidog]

1 hour ago, JohninDublin said:

Force becomes a last resort. If the Military are going to stage a coup, it will only be if they don't like the result of an election. The danger in the interim is that orgs like TikTok, can skew the election results so that a coup becomes unnecessary.

Well it’s odd how this force of last resort has been used 13 times successfully and many more attempts in Thailand since the start of the 20th century. Other countries haven’t had anything like as many. The whole world is having to work out how to deal with misinformation across many sources on the internet and it’s a waste of time and will never get resolved. I certainly see the Thai Army being a far bigger risk to democracy in Thailand than anything TikTok can do. 
 

I understand that misinformation can lead to voters placing misguided confidence and voting in a particular way. But that’s no worse than a genuine political party claiming they will do something if you vote for them and then fail to deliver. That is also a source of misinformation. They essentially lie to the electorate in order to gain votes. We need to prioritise issues with democracy and I see TikTok as being way down that priority list. 
 

Incidentally, if I awoke (can’t say w-oke up) and found myself king of the world one day, the first thing I would do is stop Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and Twitter. All are the work of the devil and bring out the very worst in people in my opinion! 

[JohninDublin]

14 hours ago, JohninDublin said:

This needs a fuller reply, and I am just going out for my night's entertainment. But @KaptainRobwas in the right direction with talk of CCP input.

 

20 hours ago, TheDirtyDurian said:

Most media have some kind of bias, just look at newspapers in the uk, gbnews, fox news etc

"it was the Sun wot won it" and so on... 

They're all going to put some kind of spin on elections 

Are voting intentions so capricious they'll be dependent on a tiktok video? I dunno. 

Totally agree with most of that, but you also need to bear in mind that the UK orgs that you cite are subject to libel laws as well as regulation.

But the thing that concerns me is alluded to in @Grumpishpost. It is the likelihood that someone reading a post that is dishonest will not bother to do their own due diligence, and I be inclined to think that would apply to a lot of who get their political news from sources such as TikTok. Given time the lies can be disproved and people become aware that they were lied to, but if they've already cast their vote, they can't take it back.

If you look at how Ashcroft ran his Brexit campaign, you will understand my point quite clearly. What he did did was to form focus groups asking what worried most about the EU. They identified 7 major issues, the greatest of which was Immigrants especially Muslims. At the time Remain had a clear lead in the polls. Then one by one, they released a dubious story linked to each of the 7 fears. The lead was being chipped away. Then with just days to go, they announced that Turkey was just about to join the EU, there were 95 mill of them, and they were coming our way. In support of this, Farage produced that infamous poster of refugees fleeing from some conflict. https://www.bbc.com/news/av/uk-politics-48244663

Here is where the real problem lies; the proximity of this blatant lie to the date of the vote and the inabaility of many to see through this lie. There would have been plenty of people on both sides of the argument who knew it was a blatant lie, but for the Brexiteers, they were not going to say "This is a lie". Given time, this could have been exposed as totally untrue. The facts were that Turkey had applied to join the EU in the 80's, and were ganted candidate status, subject to carrying out about 25 tasks. In the 30 years following, they had only achieved one of these. Why were they so slow in performing the remaining tasks?

The answer is that had they put themselves through that pain, they still had to overcome the Veto of both Greece and Cyprus. In the 70's, Turkey had invaded a small section of Cyprus and renamed it Turkish North Cyprus, and even issued the locals with passports, which are largely unrecognised by the rest of the world. Both Greece and Cyprus had announced that as long as Turkey continues to occupy that enclave, they will Veto EU the membership application made by Turkey if they ever achieve the unfulfilled tasks.

To complicate matters further, the Turks and the Greeks have had a long history of mutual hatred, and the Turks are only too happy that they have got one over on the Greeks with North Cyprus. But if the time ever arrives where the Turks have fulfilled the entry requirements, there are plenty of Turks who would consider it a national disgrace to vacate Cyprus. Anyone who had known about the EU membership process and the history between Greece and Cyprus

I'd estimate that maybe 60% of the UK electorate had a good idea of what the truth was in this case, but with 30% being on the side of Brexit, they were in no hurry to debunk the lie. 33 Mill voted, and if my estimate is correct, 13 mill were probably unaware of this lie. I have little doubt that this lie was the tipping point, but being so close to the day of the vote, it really could not be counteracted.

So looking to the future, supposing that the CCP takes an interest inthe next UK elections. I'm sure that I will be accused of being patronising for saying this, but I dont think TikTok fans are famed for their political nous.

That's why I find the whole thing so alarming. Under UK law, a question cannot be libellous. So imagine a post on TikTok along the lines of, "Is it true that Cabinet Minister X is being investigated for sex crimes?" just days before an election. Intermingle that with an old news clip of him saying "No comment" to another totally unrelated issue. Hmmm?

If TikTok, Facebook, etc are misused in this way, they will be looking to get their message to the politically unsophisticated who will read the post, and not be bothered to check for corroboration. 

[JohninDublin]

41 minutes ago, Soidog said:

Well it’s odd how this force of last resort has been used 13 times successfully and many more attempts in Thailand since the start of the 20th century. Other countries haven’t had anything like as many. The whole world is having to work out how to deal with misinformation across many sources on the internet and it’s a waste of time and will never get resolved. I certainly see the Thai Army being a far bigger risk to democracy in Thailand than anything TikTok can do. 
 

I understand that misinformation can lead to voters placing misguided confidence and voting in a particular way. But that’s no worse than a genuine political party claiming they will do something if you vote for them and then fail to deliver. That is also a source of misinformation. They essentially lie to the electorate in order to gain votes. We need to prioritise issues with democracy and I see TikTok as being way down that priority list. 
 

Incidentally, if I awoke (can’t say w-oke up) and found myself king of the world one day, the first thing I would do is stop Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and Twitter. All are the work of the devil and bring out the very worst in people in my opinion! 

Am I going to go down another series of rabbit holes with you? During those 13 coups, where was Facebook, TikTok etc? It was only following the Brexit vote and 2016 US elections that people started to realise the way that Social Media could be misused.

This is a new phenomenon and tool in the demagogues armoury. It will become the tool of first resort. Coups will remain secondary.

As for politicians lying to the electorate, they can eventually be called to account by the electorate. Who is held accountable when lies are told on social media to distort an election result?

[Soidog]

20 minutes ago, JohninDublin said:

Am I going to go down another series of rabbit holes with you? During those 13 coups, where was Facebook, TikTok etc? It was only following the Brexit vote and 2016 US elections that people started to realise the way that Social Media could be misused.

This is a new phenomenon and tool in the demagogues armoury. It will become the tool of first resort. Coups will remain secondary.

As for politicians lying to the electorate, they can eventually be called to account by the electorate. Who is held accountable when lies are told on social media to distort an election result?

I wasn’t aware we had been down rabbit holes before, I thought we had debates? But anyway! 

I think you underestimate the intelligence of the electorate. For every piece of misinformation on one side of a debate, there is an equal amount on the other. For example,  £350 million a day on the pro Brexit side and total financial meltdown on the remain side.  This results in equal amounts of potential gullibility and hence it tends to cancel out.
 

It’s amazing how Brexit and Trump are often seen as examples of voter manipulation through misinformation. Most of the reasons people voted as they did remain even if you remove distorted facts or figures. Most people who voted Trump couldn’t care less if the immigration numbers are 1/10th what Trump said they would be. They don’t want mass immigration of any form and would still vote Trump. They don’t care if more jobs are being created in the US than being shipped to China, they don’t want any jobs going to China that could be done in the US.

As for accountability for misinformation. How on earth could you legislate for it and police it with a world wide internet? It’s futile to even consider it or expect it to happen. As I say, these are not threats to democracy that can be resolved. Having Army Generals who decide to roll out the tanks when they decide the country is not being run as they wish is a far bigger issue that can be resolved. Most developed countries have already done so. Focus on what can be fixed and not what is wishful thinking. 

[JohninDublin]

15 minutes ago, Soidog said:

I wasn’t aware we had been down rabbit holes before, I thought we had debates? But anyway! 

I think you underestimate the intelligence of the electorate. For every piece of misinformation on one side of a debate, there is an equal amount on the other. For example,  £350 million a day on the pro Brexit side and total financial meltdown on the remain side.  This results in equal amounts of potential gullibility and hence it tends to cancel out.
 

It’s amazing how Brexit and Trump are often seen as examples of voter manipulation through misinformation. Most of the reasons people voted as they did remain even if you remove distorted facts or figures. Most people who voted Trump couldn’t care less if the immigration numbers are 1/10th what Trump said they would be. They don’t want mass immigration of any form and would still vote Trump. They don’t care if more jobs are being created in the US than being shipped to China, they don’t want any jobs going to China that could be done in the US.

As for accountability for misinformation. How on earth could you legislate for it and police it with a world wide internet? It’s futile to even consider it or expect it to happen. As I say, these are not threats to democracy that can be resolved. Having Army Generals who decide to roll out the tanks when they decide the country is not being run as they wish is a far bigger issue that can be resolved. Most developed countries have already done so. Focus on what can be fixed and not what is wishful thinking. 

You appear to have forgotten our debate about Mick Lynch and your false claims about him being a Communist, which then morphed into how I would pay the workers to resolve the strkes when that claim about Lynch failed. You just simply changed the subject.

Regarding "cancelling out", my view on that is that there were very few lies told on the leave side. That is not to say that Osborne in particular did not get his predictions wrong, but much of what was claimed by Leave were blatant lies. Mistakes can be forgiven, but when (eg) Bojo claims on Public TV, that 62% of all recent UK laws were imposed on us by the EU, I can understand why people think, we need to take back control. The true figures according to the House of Commons Library, is that 12% of our legislation was derived from Brussels. However it also pointed out that in 95% of these laws, the UK actually voted for these, so the real figure was just 0.6% of laws being imposed on us by the EU. So Bojo was out by a factor of 10000%, and we know about his propensity for lying, so I don't think that is forgivable.

And while I am on the subject of the lies being told about EU laws being imposed on us, for the past eight years, I've been asjing the complainers to name one of these laws and how they have been adversely affected by thema and have never received a response. They read about them in the right-wing tabloids, but it never occurred to them that the laws were never actually described. For the benefit of those who are unaware, they are mainly laws which deal with health and safety, consumer protection, ECWVTA which is credited with saving over 100k lives in the UK alone since 1972. Then there are employment rights, such as the right not to be sacked for refusing to work beyond 48 hours in a week. Or how about the fact that there was never any entitlement to statutory holiday pay in the UK until it was introduced by the EU? You can understand why the right-wing media never wanted to describe these laws. Why would the average man in the street want to complain about these laws. It is situations such as this that can lead to people saying, "I know I voted Leave, but this isn't what I voted for". And that's what happens when voters are deliberately misled.

Regarding accountability, I am not sure what the answer is, but the fact that I have no answer does not make it acceptable, or more importantly, ethical. 

[KaptainRob]

Going well off-topic gents, please end it here.

[Soidog]

15 minutes ago, KaptainRob said:

Going well off-topic gents, please end it here.

Agreed!