Rumah Pemilu Indonesia Election Portal
As the 2024 Election voting approaches, the Civil Society Coalition against Election Disinformation released findings of information disturbances regarding the election. These findings include false news or hoaxes, and hate speech on social media networks. Throughout the year 2023, the percentage of political disinformation reached 55.5%, marking the highest in elections.
“Throughout 2023, we found a total of 1,292 instances of political disinformation. This year’s figure is more than double that of 2019, which had 644 instances,” said Septiaji Eko Nugroho, Chair of the Presidium of Masyarakat Anti Fitnah Indonesia [Indonesian Anti-Defamation Society] (Mafindo), during a press conference on “Election Hoax Findings and Potential Hoaxes Ahead of the Voting” at the Bawaslu Office in Jakarta (2/12).
Septiaji stated that YouTube is the most prevalent platform for spreading political hoaxes, with a percentage of 44.6%, followed by Facebook at 34.4%, TikTok at 9.3%, Twitter or X at 8%, WhatsApp at 1.5%, and Instagram being the smallest at 1.4%. According to him, as the voting day approaches, the number of hoaxes circulating on social media is increasing. In January 2024, Mafindo found 347 hoaxes, with 214 being political hoaxes and 150 election hoaxes.
Furthermore, based on Mafindo’s findings, all presidential and vice-presidential candidates have become targets of political hoaxes. Septiaji explained that Anies Baswedan is the candidate most frequently mentioned in hoax narratives, with 206 positive-toned political hoaxes and 116 negative-toned ones. Meanwhile, Muhaimin Iskandar is the least targeted by hoaxes, with only 17 positive and 5 negative hoaxes.
Meanwhile, Ganjar Pranowo received 63 positive hoaxes and 73 negative hoaxes, while Mahfud Md received 44 positive hoaxes and 5 negative hoaxes. Then Prabowo Subianto-Gibran Rakabuming Raka received a total of 140 negative hoaxes. In detail, Prabowo received 66 negative hoaxes and 28 positive hoaxes, while Gibran received 74 negative hoaxes and 12 positive hoaxes.
“The concern is that there has been a shift in the issues. The issues attempting to delegitimize the election organizers are increasing,” he said.
The coalition also found disinformation that delegitimizes the electoral process, through content attacking the election organizers and the credibility of the electoral stages. The topics of disinformation include issues related to the independence of election organizers and the bias of election organizers towards certain candidates. Meanwhile, topics attacking the credibility of the electoral stages are related to irregularities in the electoral process and foreign interference in the conduct of the electoral stages.
“These categories strongly suggest that the election organizers are partisan and are conducting the electoral stages to ensure the victory of specific candidate pairs and political parties,” said Nurul Amalia, Researcher at the Association for Elections and Democracy (Perkumpulan untuk Pemilu dan Demokrasi or Perludem).
Furthermore, Amalia also mentioned that based on the monitoring results of the Southeast Asia Freedom of Expression Network (SAFEnet), hate speech on social media against vulnerable groups increased as the voting day approached. At least 140 pieces of hate speech content were found on Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok during September 2023. Amalia noted that the most targeted minority groups were women with 42 pieces of content, Lesbian, Gay, Transgender, Queer (LGBTIQ) with 33 pieces of content, mental disabilities with 31 pieces of content, Rohingya refugees with 17 pieces of content, and the remaining were Chinese minority ethnic groups and indigenous communities.
Member of the Election Supervisory Body (Bawaslu) Lolly Suhenty stated that through cooperation with the Ministry of Communication and Information Technology (Kominfo), Bawaslu found 255 election violations in the form of fake news and hate speech on social media. Lolly mentioned that out of the 342 election violation findings on social media, the majority targeted presidential and vice-presidential candidates, while the rest targeted the General Election Commission (KPU) and Bawaslu.
“Bawaslu also took swift action by promptly taking down violating content and intensifying monitoring on social media,” she said.
Lolly also encouraged the public to collectively monitor social media content by reporting hate speech and hoaxes to Bawaslu. She also mentioned that they would strengthen cooperation with social media platforms to prevent election violations after the election.
During the press conference, Badan Siber dan Sandi Negara [the State Cyber and Cryptography Agency] (BSSN) also presented its findings. BSSN’s Young Policy Analyst, Nurul Hasani, stated that from January 2023 until now, there have been 549 instances of misinformation on social media, involving 91 crucial issues. She mentioned that half of the misinformation occurred during the campaign period, with 259 findings and 3 crucial election issues.
“The handling of hoaxes by BSSN utilizes a cyber-security detection system to identify negative content and election hoaxes,” he explained.
The coalition stated that the most influential hoaxes in the 2024 Election contain claims of support for specific candidates, with a percentage of 33.1%. Apart from that, many attacks against candidates, political figures, and the government use corruption issues, amounting to 12.8% of the hoaxes. Rejection hoaxes make up 10.7%, negative character or lifestyle hoaxes constitute 7.3%, election fraud issues make up 5%, and ethnic and religious issues account for 3.9%. According to the coalition, election fraud, government bias, and electoral administration issues, although not among the top three, significantly impact public trust in the election.
Therefore, the coalition urges social media platforms to regularly remove accounts that are observed to produce and spread disinformation and hate speech related to the election. The coalition notes that the deleted content constitutes interference in the electoral information and has exceeded freedom of expression. Such efforts are considered necessary because they can damage public trust in the electoral process and have the potential to trigger conflicts within society. []
Translated by Catherine Natalia
