Em TSE hearing chaired by Minister Carmen Lúcia on the court's resolutions that will rule the 2024 electoral election, the Executive Director of the Instituto Democracia em Xeque, Dr. Fabiano Garrido, warned of the risk of a lack of transparency on the part of Social Media Platforms, notably Google and Meta, in the management of sponsored ads during the election period. The expert showed, based on data made available by the TSE, that the amounts invested in this type of advertisement, popularly known as “boosting”, during the 2022 elections, totaled 375 million reais, 250 million of which with resources coming from the electoral fund and the difference coming from individual resources, such as campaign donations. Garrido also highlighted that these values ​​refer exclusively to expenses during the electoral period, not considering the resources spent in the pre-campaign period, data that is not available, further increasing the values ​​invested in this type of electoral propaganda. Still according to Garrido, the companies Google and Meta are the beneficiaries, in almost equal parts, for more than two thirds of the total amount of 375 million spent on promoting electoral content. The expert also recalls that this value is expected to grow even more in the 2024 electoral cycle. Faced with this situation, Garrido warns of the urgent need for the amounts spent to have due transparency and publicity, as they are expenses that use public resources to electoral purposes. However, this data is treated opaquely by the Platforms, which maintain the “advertisement libraries” in a provisional and insufficient manner, not presenting, for example, the distribution of expenses and postage at municipal level, just on the eve of municipal elections. . Finally, the expert also points to the complexity that the topic acquires at a time when the advent of generative Artificial Intelligence can further amplify the risks of electoral disinformation. In this case, Garrido points out: the ideal would be for the TSE to adopt a specific resolution on AI, consulting experts and civil society.

Image: Largest Boosting Suppliers of paid content in the 2022 elections.

Data source: https://sig.tse.jus.br/ords/dwapr/r/seai/ sig-prestacao-contas/tipo-de-despesa?session=12591014259502

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