Happy Nice Mall

Ahead of the 2020 election, Connecticut faced a lot of lies about voting circulating online. One widely viewed on Facebook said that the wrong ballots were sent to dead people. Users on Twitter spread a false post that a tractor carrying ballots crashed into Interstate 95, sending thousands of voter slips into the air and onto the highway.

Worried about a similar flood of unfounded rumors and lies about this year’s midterm elections, the state plans to spend nearly $2 million on marketing to share true information on voting and establish a first-ever expert position in fighting misinformation. With a $150,000 salary, the person is expected to bring together fringe sites like 4chan, far-right social networks like Gettr and Rumble, and mainstream social media sites to root out early narratives of misinformation about the vote before it goes viral, and then promote companies. Remove or flag posts with false information.

“We must have situational awareness by examining all incoming threats to the integrity of elections,” said Scott Bates, Connecticut’s deputy secretary of state. “Incorrect information can undermine people’s confidence in elections, and we see this as a serious threat to the democratic process.”’

Connecticut joins a handful of states preparing to battle a string of rumors and lies about this year’s election.

Oregon, Idaho, and Arizona have educational and advertising campaigns on the internet, TV, radio, and billboards to disseminate accurate information about voting times, voter eligibility, and absentee voting. Colorado has hired three cybersecurity experts to monitor sites for misinformation. The California state office is investigating misinformation and is working with the Department of Homeland Security and academics to investigate patterns of misinformation on the Internet.

The moves of these states, most of which are under Democratic control, came as voters’ confidence in electoral integrity fell. inside ABC/Ipsos survey By January, only 20 percent of respondents said they were “very confident” in the integrity of the electoral system, and 39 percent said they were “somewhat confident”. Numerous Republican candidates have embraced former President Donald J. Trump’s lies about the 2020 election and campaigned on the false claim that the election was stolen from him – often successful.

Some conservatives and civil rights groups almost certainly complain that efforts to limit misinformation could curtail freedom of expression. Florida, led by Republicans, has passed a law limiting the social media control that sites like Facebook, YouTube and Twitter can do, and supporters say the sites restrict conservative voices. At the federal level, the Department of Homeland Security recently halted the work of an advisory board on disinformation after a spate of criticism from conservative lawmakers and free speech advocates that the group could suppress speech.

“State and local governments are in a good position to mitigate harm from false and misinformation by providing timely, accurate and reliable information,” said Rachel Goodman, attorney for Protect Democracy, a neutral advocacy group. But to maintain that trust, they must make it clear that they are not engaging in any censorship or surveillance that would raise constitutional concerns.”

The problem of misinformation has worsened since 2020, and without a more concerted effort to counter it, Connecticut and Colorado officials said more voters could lose faith in the correctness of elections. They also said they were concerned about the safety of some election workers.

“We are seeing an environment of threat unlike anything this country has seen before,” said Jena Griswold, Democratic Secretary of State for Colorado. Ms. Griswold, who is about to be reelected this fall, has received threats for supporting the 2020 election results and denying Mr Trump’s allegations of voting fraud in the state.

Other foreign ministers, who headed the office typically tasked with overseeing elections, received similar reactions. In Georgia, Republican Brad Raffensperger, who documented President Biden’s victory in the state, faced fierce criticism for the 2020 election, full of false claims.

In his first race this year, Mr. Raffensperger battled misinformation that there were 66,000 underage voters, 2,400 unregistered voters and more than 10,350 dead people in the presidential election. None of the allegations are true. He won his first match last week.

Colorado is reassigning a misinformation team the state has created for the 2020 election. The team consists of three election security experts who monitor the internet for misinformation and then report it to federal law enforcement.

Miss Griswold will oversee the team called the Rapid Response Election Security Cyber ​​Unit. He said he was only investigating election-related misinformation on issues such as absentee voting, polling locations and eligibility.

“The truth still exists and lies are used to erode our fundamental freedoms,” said Ms. Griswold.

Connecticut officials said the state’s goal was to patrol the Internet for election lies. On May 7, the Connecticut legislature approved $2 million for internet, TV, mail, and radio education campaigns related to the election process and the hiring of an election information security officer.

Officials said they would prefer candidates who can speak both English and Spanish to avoid the spread of misinformation in both languages. The officer will monitor viral misinformation posts on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, specifically looking for narratives and memes that are popping up on social media platforms and the dark web.

“We know we can’t boil the ocean, but we need to find out where the threat is coming from and before it metastasizes,” said Mr Bates.