17
Dec
2024
Watch
Misinformation and disinformation on social media platforms, such as TikTok, and related risks to the integrity of elections in Europe (debate)
Madam President, I'm sorry. Political communication is undergoing a fundamental change today. On social media, you have 5-10 seconds to grab people's attention. I think we need to adapt. The change has never been stopped by prohibition and rigid regulation. But we also know that when politics meets money, it is there that rules and regulations are most needed. Because if they don't, campaigns will be flooded with financially outnumbered people, and politics will be dominated by paid influencers and manipulation machines. In Hungary, we can see and experience this every day. The taxpayers of the government's centralized fake news factory use billions of dollars to build fear and insecurity and smear their opponents. We saw it in the Romanian elections: When foreign influence, power interests and money are behind the manipulation, the whole democratic process is at risk and becomes opaque. One of the main questions, in my view, is how we can regulate the financing of campaigns in such a way that it is transparent and that no one can abuse its financial power. If we act wisely now, we can guarantee that the next elections will be about people's free choice.