Executive Summary
Taiwan was among the first democracies in 2024 to hold elections. On January 13, the people of Taiwan headed to the polls to elect their president and legislators. Despite evolving disinformation tactics, Taiwan’s 2024 elections took place without a major crisis. This report aims to understand the role of disinformation in Taiwan’s elections, particularly in the presidential race, and how the relevant actors, including government entities, tech companies, civil society and — perhaps most tellingly — the people of Taiwan, addressed it. The report highlights the following takeaways:
Taiwan is not new to disinformation and election interference. But strategies and tactics of information have evolved and continued to challenge election integrity. In the 2024 presidential election, the latest disinformation campaigns were better at blending facts with fiction to create misleading narratives, making it more challenging to track the sources of disinformation. Furthermore, Internet personalities played a more significant role in both perpetuating and debunking disinformation.
AI primarily showed up in deepfake videos and audio — technologies that predated the most recent election cycle. To the extent that AI tools were used to create deepfakes, they were not sophisticated. As such, fact-checkers were able to debunk them with relative ease but noted that continued vigilance will be important going forward.
Despite the increasing complexity of disinformation tactics, Taiwan has developed a multifaceted approach for combating disinformation and built resilience against disinformation through cross-sector collaboration. Its strategy relied on various stakeholders — government, tech companies, civil society, and the public — to come together to combat disinformation. All this amounted to what President Tsai Ingwen called “a whole of society” effort in combating disinformation.
A standout initiative from Taiwan’s civil society is the adoption of new technologies for real-time fact-checking. Over the years, Taiwan’s fact-checkers have emerged as an integral part of Taiwan’s fight against disinformation.
Ultimately, the long-term antidote to disinformation lies in building societal resilience. Taiwan has been on the forefront of building such resilience by raising public awareness about predictable vectors of disinformation and by supporting an electoral infrastructure attuned to such tactics. These efforts have been supplemented by initiatives across society so that individuals are empowered and able to navigate the digital landscape more analytically.
