India should be on guard against foreign powers focused on undermining Indian democracy by promoting their own agenda on the social media during the forthcoming general elections, said Andrew Keen, British-American author and broadcaster known for his highly critical view of the current Internet culture.
Talking to The Hindu on the sidelines of the 44th World Congress of International Advertising Association here on Wednesday, Mr. Keen said that India, which had been historically riven by ethnic and religious divisions and the dark forces they unleashed, was very vulnerable to incitement through the Internet.
He observed that the majority of Indians did not possess the sophistication to distinguish between propaganda and credible news. While the quality of life was improving and the economy changing drastically, many Indians did not have the disposable income to pay for monthly content, making them vulnerable to uncurated content on free social media platforms such as YouTube and Facebook, Mr. Keen remarked.
“India is a country where passions can run high and social media lends itself to such passionate outpouring of emotions. For all these reasons, India is very prone to the kind of fake news and hysteria that corrupted the last U.S. elections and undermined the democratic forces,” he said.
Mr. Keen warned against the exploitation of the social media platforms for inciting communal hatred, citing how they were used in the U.S. and Europe by racists, neo-Nazis and elements opposed to women, children, Jews and blacks. He said that the rise of right wing populist parties in the U.S. and Brexit in the U.K. were no coincidences.
“Internet is a highly dangerous platform that can accentuate ethnic, religious and gender animosities. It’s not an enlightening platform but lends itself to segregation,” Mr. Keen said.
He said that Canadian Philosopher Marshall McLuhan’s prophecy of electronic media being a global village had come true, albeit ironically, with the Internet compounding the hypocrisy and parochialism associated with village life.
Drawing attention to his latest book How to Fix the Future, Mr. Keen called for a much more regulated regime to control Internet-based platforms. “These platforms need to be made accountable for the lies and hatred they publish. The Europeans have already begun it with the Germans even handing out financial punishments every time something illegal is published over these platforms,” he said.
Mr. Keen urged consumers to be more demanding and quit platforms that propagate violence and hatred.