The idea of electoral misinformation is applied for the first time in this electoral process. There is no way to regulate it as explained in I choose two specialists from the Bolivia check platform, which works in the verification of information that is disseminated through the Internet.
“Social networks are so great, so powerful, it has no limits, You cannot really confirm 100% that you are talking to a specific sourceeven if you have the name and last name, it is difficult to identify who is really behind the account as a natural person, then we believe that there are degrees of difficulty and that they will not be overcome with regulations, ”said Enid López, Fact Checker in Chief of Checking Bolivia
During the first electoral round, Platforms dedicated to the monitoring of false news on the Internet revealed excessive spending of groups linked to candidate Samuel Doria Medina to discredit their adversaries. In this second round, they also identified people linked to Jorge Tuto Quiroga for unleashing a war of discreditations against Rodrigo Paz, the other ballot candidate.
Specialists believe that The regulation of social networks that the different parties spoke, but mainly the most will not be the solution of the problem for the complexity of social networks. So far the ruling party rehearsed the regulation of social networks, but succumbed in the attempt.
“In fact In several countries it has been tried to generate regulations and laws To regulate and punish the issue of misinformation and have failed in the process, they have not finished consolidating as laws, because who defines misinformation would be the government that is on duty that defines misinformation, but also as you control that, how you identify who are behind the misinformation, ”questioned Juan Carlos Uribe, coordinator of the Bolivia check.
Specialist Enid López He explained that there are many ways to create misinformationmainly audios that are more difficult to detect. In the case of videos, it can be easily detected by people’s gestures and in photographs there are tools that allow to verify the falsehood of a photo.
The specialist recommends always going to the primary source, that is, the protagonists of a certain photograph.
Verification of information through various sources It is also the most used resource to verify whether information is false or true. The Supreme Electoral Court (TSE) worked with the three national entities dedicated to the monitoring of false news and plans to carry out the same year for the October 19 ballot.
