Key takeaways from EC’s social media political ad rules announcement

Social Samosa

14 Mar 2019 08:22 IST

New Update

Amidst all the elections buzz in the digitalverse and all over, Sunil Arora, Chief Election Officer announced the much-anticipated dates for elections 2019.

He also highlighted several measures that are being implemented to ensure free, fair and participative election polls this year.

While competing parties are going gung ho on social media carrying out camnpaigns at multiple levels, Arora mentioned that to address fake news and hate speech during elections in India, social media platforms are appointing dedicated grievance officers to “take necessary and prompt actions against the contents published on their platforms."

Intermediaries like Facebook, Twitter, Google and YouTube have committed in writing to ensure that any political advertisement published on their platforms will be certified by Election Commission’s Media Certification and Monitoring Committee. Candidates will also have to include online and social media elections expenditure in their expenditure disclosures, also adhering to the “silence period” that comes into effect 48 hours before the polls.

Nikhil Pahwa listed down some key takeaways from social media related announcement as below:

So key Internet and social media related takeaways from the Election Commission of India's 2019 elections announcement on Fake News, Online political advertising and the Model Code of Conduct:
(1/8)

(Pls RT thread!)
— Nikhil Pahwa (@nixxin) March 10, 2019

(3/8) Fake News:
- Social Media platforms have committed to take action on any content reported by designated officers of Election Commission of India, which violates the electoral laws.
— Nikhil Pahwa (@nixxin) March 10, 2019

Also Read: With BJP’s #5yearchallenge, 2019 General Elections to see political war of memes

(4/8) Fake News:
- Internet and Mobile Association of India, in consultation with the Election Commission of India, is formulating a set of code of ethics for intermediary online platforms. This is a work in progress.
— Nikhil Pahwa (@nixxin) March 10, 2019

(5/8) Online political advertising:
- Google and Facebook will do verification of political advertisers.
- All expenditure of campaigning on social media is to be included in the candidates election expenditure disclosure.
— Nikhil Pahwa (@nixxin) March 10, 2019

(6/8) Online political advertising
- FB,Twitter,Google&YouTube have committed in writing to do precertification of political advertising by EC's Media Certification &Monitoring Committee (MCMC),which has an additional member with expertise in social media at state&district level
— Nikhil Pahwa (@nixxin) March 10, 2019

(7/8) Model Code of Conduct:
- will apply to political advertising AND social media content being posted by political parties.
- All candidates have to disclose their social media accounts to the Election Commission
— Nikhil Pahwa (@nixxin) March 10, 2019

(8/8) Model Code of Conduct:
- Election Commission has an app where citizens can provide them information about violating of model code of conduct. The authority is duty-bound to respond to complaints within 100 minutes.
— Nikhil Pahwa (@nixxin) March 10, 2019

Adding my opinion here:
a. What about WhatsApp? It probably has the largest daily active user reach among social media (oops: messaging) platforms, & is extensively used by political parties. Has truckloads of hate speech, fake news, paid messaging. What will will EC, WA do?
— Nikhil Pahwa (@nixxin) March 10, 2019

b. Model code of conduct can't apply to political party supporters. Campaigning deadline is useless. Politicians will stop giving speeches, but speeches will continue to be circulated after deadline.
— Nikhil Pahwa (@nixxin) March 10, 2019

c. Paid influencer campaigns? As someone in a protected tweet also mentioned, how will EC deal with twitter trends and paid influencers paid in cash? remember cobrapost https://t.co/a216HGFoV6
or @fs0c131y https://t.co/8UDJEnwPBG
— Nikhil Pahwa (@nixxin) March 10, 2019

d. What about other ad networks? Taboola, Outbrain, and hundreds of thousands of small networks and ad exchanges? EC is acting as if facebook, google and twitter are all there is online.
— Nikhil Pahwa (@nixxin) March 10, 2019

e. What about the Chinese apps? Tik Tok is huge in India, and Helo is gaining traction. political parties can reach out to younger audiences here. Will the EC know? Seems to be going after usual suspects.
— Nikhil Pahwa (@nixxin) March 10, 2019

Fake News and disinformation have been plaguing the world for quite some time now and the election commission has assured to take necessary actions to prevent any malfunctioning during the election period.

Lok Sabha elections 2019 will be held for in seven phases during April May for 543 seats, the results of which will be announced on May 23.

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