Preventative, reactive, restrictive?

In 2024, more attention than ever before has been focused on the integrity and resilience of democratic elections. Concerns about disinformation campaigns were high during this super election year—and remain so with the upcoming U.S. elections in November. Globally, the attention given to and investigation of disinformation campaigns, meaning the deliberate and manipulative spread of false information, has increased significantly. In November 2023, The New York Times declared the elections in Argentina as the first AI election and predicted a wave of AI-generated disinformation. Numerous analyses on Taiwan (January), Indonesia (February), South Africa (May), Mexico (June), and the European Parliament elections (June) followed. The common thread: Disinformation campaigns by state-affiliated actors (Russia, China) are being launched, bots and fake accounts are attempting to influence social media, and AI-generated content is being deployed in all these countries. The crucial question is to what extent such campaigns are effective, influence voter behaviour, and sustainably manipulate digital discourses. This question is particularly important to answer as more pivotal elections are on the horizon—besides the U.S. presidential elections this year, the German federal election will take place next year. Against this backdrop, we sought to develop a deeper understanding of how well our societies are prepared for the challenges posed by disinformation and what measures should be taken from the perspective of the public. For this study, 5,055 people in Germany were surveyed between 4 and 17 October 2023. In parallel, 2,018 people were also surveyed in the United States. In both cases, the target population was residents aged 16 and over.