New Guide Details Best Practices for Elections Integrity Online
Integrity Institute releases the first guide in a planned series* on supporting healthy elections across platforms; lead authors discuss the guide on Trust in Tech podcast
Over the past decade, the prominent role of internet platforms in elections has expanded dramatically. They allow candidates, political organizations and nonprofits to reach more people, more quickly, and with more efficiency. It is why almost every political campaign has adopted a “digital-first strategy.”
This expansion has allowed for more people to engage in the political process, to better understand and discuss issues that are important to them and their community, and in some cases, have brought about critical change around the globe.
But this expansion has also come at a cost. Just as platforms can be used to educate, inform and engage, they can also be used to spread misinformation, support voter suppression, and promote hate speech, bullying and real world harm.
For both established organizations and newer platforms, these issues also bring business, regulatory and reputational risks if not addressed in a thoughtful and thorough way. It’s why companies need to carefully assess how they think about these issues, and what systems and structures they put in place to deal with them.
Elections matter, and history has demonstrated online platforms will find themselves grappling with these challenges whether they want to be or not.
That’s why the Integrity Institute has created a new guide – the first in a planned series* as part of our Elections Integrity Program – on best practices for online companies to help better support healthy elections across platforms, particularly those who are newer or smaller. This new guide is a comprehensive resource of these complex topics and offers a review of the risks and the opportunities, a collection of best practices from across the industry, and practical advice for companies to implement their own programs.
The hope is this new guide will help companies to either develop a new elections integrity program or bolster any existing initiatives. It was developed by people who have first-hand experience developing some of the first initiatives to address issues like disinformation, foreign interference and hate speech when it comes to political issues online.
The guide covers a range of areas where companies need to invest to both protect themselves and contribute to ensuring elections remain safe, fair and free of interference. The guide details:
What is, and why you need, an elections program
How to initiate an elections program
An overview of existing companies' elections programs
Deeper dives into selected critical topics, plus an appendix sharing a wealth of additional resources
Ensuring the integrity of platforms is a constant battle, with dedicated adversaries and those looking to manipulate elections. We hope this guide, together with other resources created by the Integrity Institute, will help companies as they take on this important work.
* Note: The second guide in the series has been released as of October 2023.
The Integrity Institute would like to thank the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation for their support of this project. For the full list of acknowledgements, please see below.
