Appeared originally in Lawfare, November, 2020

Code is law. Lawrence Lessig’s 1999 assertion was that in a digital world, programmers were scripting a values system into their technology, often in a fit of absent-mindedness. Twenty years later, the U.S. and Europe are living in the geopolitical landscape those early pioneers created. One-time plucky startups have grown into supergiants vacuuming up ever more data and market share. Artificial intelligence (AI) is becoming both an enabler for social well-being and an instrument of authoritarian control. Emerging technologies are transforming militaries, creating new battlefields and changing the nature of warfare. U.S. and Chinese officials crisscross the world in a geostrategic great game for 5G dominance. And social media has become a vector for bad actors—including illiberal states like Russia and China—to disrupt and degrade democracies. In 2020, code is power.

The coronavirus has accelerated these trends. The pandemic has fueled data processing in contact-tracing apps; exposed vulnerabilities in supply chains; created new dependencies in classrooms and boardrooms on video communications technologies; and powered a spike in anti-vaxxer disinformation, QAnon conspiracy theories and radicalization.

THE IMMEDIATE AFTERMATH OF ELECTION DAY 2020 offers lessons about the state of American democracy as well as technology’s influence on voters, the voting process, and democratic institutions. Whatever the outcome of an election, and despite a polarized society, it is clear that all Americans share a common stake in protecting the integrity and independence of the administration of elections, the declaration of winners and losers, and a peaceful transition of power. Yet other questions persist: How have disinformation campaigns, whether domestic or foreign, affected the electoral process? And what does the future hold in terms of a tech agenda?

ANTITRUST AND PRIVACY CONCERNS are two of the most high-profile topics on the tech policy agenda. Checks and balances to counteract the power of companies such as Google, Amazon, and Facebook are under consideration in Congress, though a polarized political environment is a hindrance. But a domestic approach to tech policy will be insufficient, as the users of the large American tech companies are predominantly outside the United States. We need to point the way toward a transnational policy effort that puts democratic principles and basic human rights above the commercial interests of these private companies.

These issues are central to the eight-week Stanford University course, “Technology and the 2020 Election: How Silicon Valley Technologies Affect Elections and Shape Democracy.” The joint class for Stanford students and Stanford’s Continuing Studies Community enrolls a cross-generational population of more than 400 students from around the world.

POPULAR CULTURE HAS ENVISIONED SOCIETIES of intelligent machines for generations, with Alan Turing notably foreseeing the need for a test to distinguish machines from humans in 1950. Now, advances in artificial intelligence that promise to make creating convincing fake multimedia content like video, images, or audio relatively easy for many. Unfortunately, this will include sophisticated bots with supercharged self-improvement abilities that are capable of generating more dynamic fakes than anything seen before.

In our paper “How Relevant is the Turing Test in the Age of Sophisbots,” we argue that society is on the brink of an AI-driven technology that can simulate many of the most important hallmarks of human behavior. As the variety and scale of these so called “deepfakes” expands, they will likely be able to simulate human behavior so effectively and they will operate in such a dynamic manner that they will increasingly pass Turing’s test. 

IN 2016 WE LEARNED ABOUT EFFORTS BY FOREIGN ACTORS to interfere in the U.S. election by injecting misinformation and disinformation into public discourse on social media. False events and personas added to the polarization and manipulation of voters.

The 2020 election is marked by similar efforts, though this time the actors are domestic as well as foreign. What do we do know about people with deceptive or malicious agendas trying to influence citizens ahead of elections, to degrade democracy and sow distrust in the election results, or to spread confusion about science and facts more generally through our information systems?

VOTERS ARE BEING INUNDATED WITH POLITICAL ADVERTISING on social media and online platforms during the 2020 election season. Campaigns, PACs and third parties have added new tools and tactics for gathering data on voters and targeting them with advertising, and now they can pinpoint niches of potential voters on social media in ways unknown in prior election cycles.

Where once advertising conveyed reasons to vote for a candidate, now it frequently aims to convey misinformation, undermine trust, and depress turnout. The risk is that the spread of misinformation through such means could influence the U.S. vote, cast doubt on the democratic process and raise suspicions about the accuracy of the election outcome. 

THE EMERGENCE OF A DIGITAL SPHERE where public debate takes place raises profound questions about the connection between online information and polarization, echo chambers, and filter bubbles. Does the information ecosystem created by social media companies support the conditions necessary for a healthy democracy? Is it different from other media? These are particularly urgent questions as the United States approaches a contentious 2020 election during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The influence of technology and AI-curated information on America’s democratic process is being examined in the eight-week Stanford University course, “Technology and the 2020 Election: How Silicon Valley Technologies Affect Elections and Shape Democracy.” This issue brief focuses on the class session on “Echo Chambers, Filter Bubbles, and Polarization,” with guest experts Joan Donovan and Joshua Tucker.