Fighting Disruption, Destabilization

Forum Staff

Manipulated information campaigns threaten security by exploiting communication systems to undermine trust in social, political and strategic domains. False narratives in Myanmar, for example, included hate speech insisting Muslim minority Rohingya communities didn’t belong in the country and accusations they were burning their own villages amid a 2017 government crackdown on insurgent groups. The social media-stoked violence left at least 6,700 men, women and children dead within a month, according to the medical charity Doctors Without Borders. Some of the nearly 700,000 people who fled to neighboring Bangladesh said mobs had joined Myanmar troops to attack and kill civilians, the BBC reported in 2020.

A 2018 Facebook video that falsely accused a Muslim restaurateur in Sri Lanka of spiking customers’ food with “sterilization pills” — which don’t exist — fueled ethnic violence, The New York Times newspaper reported. For days, mobs burned mosques, Muslim-owned shops and homes, killing at least one man and prompting a nationwide state of emergency.

In authoritarian nations, where regimes police news and social media reports, and censor information that contradicts official views, state-endorsed platforms do not simply publish news. They create a reality independent of verifiable facts. And “a core principle of a healthy democracy is having a common set of facts — a set of facts that we share and agree on,” wrote Marites Dañguilan Vitug, editor of the Philippines-based Rappler news website. “Otherwise, we would be fragmented. We will not be able to have a conversation because our starting points diverge.” 

Information manipulation can disrupt and destabilize security, divide populations, and paralyze international relations. Artificial intelligence (AI) and other advances help weaponize information by increasing its scale, speed and sophistication, making it difficult to detect falsehoods and misleading content. ChatGPT maker OpenAI, for instance, said propagandists in China used the technology to mass-produce social media posts in multiple languages — and to generate comments that falsely imply the posts are receiving engagement that helps spread the distorted information to more social media users. 

AI can also rapidly produce deepfakes, false but realistic video and audio clips that malign influencers use to twist the truth. During Taiwan’s 2024 presidential election, China digitally generated fake news anchors to broadcast Beijing’s preferred message. The goal was to influence audiences on the self-governed island. Beijing also appeared to build an AI deepfake that altered a former Taiwan presidential candidate’s voice, making it seem as though he was endorsing China’s choice for office, The Wall Street Journal newspaper reported.

Beijing’s efforts to interfere with the election failed, with Taipei emphasizing election transparency and proactive messaging to counter such tactics. Globally, however, information manipulation continues to be deployed as a cognitive warfare tactic to warp narratives around territory and sovereignty, fracture social cohesion within democracies, and cast doubt on international alliances that uphold stability. In answer, like-minded countries are strengthening resilience and developing robust responses to the evolving threat.

Taipei’s resistance

Taiwan has earned its reputation for resilience by standing up to malign information campaigns. Its whole-of-society approach encompasses government vigilance, independent fact-checking groups, civic activism and public education. 

Officials embrace a strategy of rapid response, learning to identify and discredit malicious messaging as quickly as possible. “Find it early, like a tumor or cancer,” Alexander Tah-Ray Yui, Taiwan’s economic and cultural representative to the United States, told The Associated Press (AP). “Cut it before it spreads.” Taipei used the approach during the COVID-19 pandemic, holding daily briefings to quickly provide accurate information so rumors had less time to spread.

Independent networks screen online content, debunk fake claims and share verified information. Many of the organizations were established by ordinary citizens, such as MyGoPen founder Charles Yeh, who created the fact-checking chatbot service after realizing that online rumors were confusing his relatives, the AP reported. Others, including the Taiwan FactCheck Center, say they preserve their independence in part by declining government funding. When manipulated video accused officials of fraud during the 2024 election, popular YouTube broadcasters published videos explaining how Taiwan’s vote-counting system works.

Media literacy — the ability to access, analyze and evaluate content — is part of Taipei’s school curriculum. Organizations such as Fake News Cleaner host workshops and outreach events to educate residents — from children to seniors — on combating information manipulation. Fact-checkers publicize the methods that malign actors use, essentially “prebunking” before dangerous narratives take hold. Social scientists refer to the tactic as inoculation against disinformation.

Taipei uses AI detection tools to spot deepfakes and other deceitful means of spreading harmful narratives. Cyber Ambassador Audrey Tang said it is “crucial that AI is trained to serve the greater good, while unlocking our collective wisdom and building a more accountable and participatory digital society.” Transparency is the way forward, she said during the June 2025 launch of the Artificial Intelligence Advisory Group on Elections in Washington, D.C., calling for civil society and government to “co-govern” the technology.

“Taiwan has become a sought-after voice in global AI governance,” The Diplomat magazine reported. “In effect, it has already lived the future others fear, emerging stronger on the other side of AI-fueled disinformation by harnessing the technology’s potential.”

France fights back

France is countering foreign malign information while seeking to safeguard democratic principles such as free expression. Paris prioritizes legislation crafted to manage risks without introducing government censorship.

Policymakers contend that manipulated information, particularly when created and disseminated by foreign actors, threatens security, social cohesion and election integrity. Paris opted for a legal response after 2017, when Russia aimed its malign information machinery at France’s presidential election. Days before the final voting, hackers published information — including emails and forgeries — purportedly from candidate Emmanuel Macron’s campaign. The influence attempt failed to significantly affect results — Macron was elected to his first term — but succeeded in raising French awareness and determination to fight back. Because of the nation’s long constitutional tradition of free speech, lawmakers crafted legislation that criminalizes the spread of false or manipulative information aimed at misleading the public, but the 2018 law does not target opinions.

It empowers judges during election periods to order the removal of “inaccurate or misleading allegations or statements likely to affect the sincerity of the vote” when they are “disseminated on a massive scale in a deliberate, artificial or automated manner via an online public communication service.” The legislation also requires digital platforms to disclose the sponsors of paid content. 

France leverages the open-source Disinformation Analysis and Risk Management (DISARM) framework to detect, scrutinize and mitigate manipulated information. Drawing on global best practices, the framework emphasizes sharing data and analysis to counter malign information. The DISARM Foundation also maintains a database of influence operations, providing a common language for sharing intelligence and understanding manipulative behavior. Analysts say the mechanism enables authorities to respond to false and misleading information case by case instead of using blanket restrictions.

France’s Service for Vigilance and Protection against Foreign Digital Interference (Viginum), meanwhile, focuses on countering foreign information manipulation and interference. To ensure the agency would not be used to censor opposition or restrict free speech, Paris created criteria to distinguish domestic from foreign information. “Its focus was solely on massive, purposeful, artificial, or automated dissemination of manifestly inaccurate or misleading content,” Dr. Agnieszka K. Cianciara, an associate professor at the Polish Academy of Sciences, wrote for the EU-Values Network. “An independent Ethical and Scientific Committee provided oversight.” Viginum identifies and exposes threats. It does not remove online content but provides evidence that can trigger legal processes, diplomatic responses or public warnings.

France’s layered approach is designed to balance security and free speech. Citizens can express controversial opinions. When foreign malign actors embark on clandestine influence campaigns, however, government can intervene. Using the DISARM system to assess risk and Viginum to pull back the curtain on foreign interference, France does not broadly criminalize falsehoods or allow the government to define truth. Instead, it targets coordinated campaigns that aim to distort democratic debate.

Manila exposes aggression

As the Philippines confronts Beijing’s aggression in the South China Sea, it also must battle skewed narratives about maritime rights in the region. One of its weapons is “The Stories of Teacher Jun,” a 40-page comic book unveiled in early 2025. 

Public education and outreach help the archipelago’s 118 million citizens understand and counter malign influence campaigns. Beijing illegally claims almost all of the South China Sea, asserting “historic” rights to territory inside the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone (EEZ), where international law gives a country sole rights to resources. With the comic, Philippine national security leaders explain Manila’s legal rights in the sea and the 2016 international tribunal ruling that invalidated China’s claims, simplifying complex maritime law and sovereignty issues with accessible language.

“Teacher Jun” complements official transparency and civic fact-checking as part of the Philippine strategy to defeat malign messaging. Manila also uses photographs, videos and other evidence to expose Beijing’s aggression in the South China Sea. Since 2023, Philippine officials have documented and publicized dangerous actions by China Coast Guard, navy and maritime militia vessels. Chinese personnel fire water cannons at smaller Philippine vessels, block patrols and fishing crews, pursue and ram Manila’s ships and, in one instance, used knives and other weapons to threaten and injure Philippine military personnel.

While China has used such tactics for years, it often happened outside public view, allowing Beijing to deny allegations. By exposing the antagonism, the Philippines rallied domestic and international support and refuted Beijing’s claim that it is not an aggressor. Meanwhile, civil society has joined the fight. One such organization, Atin Ito! (This is Ours!), has led humanitarian missions to support fishing crews in the Philippines’ EEZ. The resulting international news coverage infuriated Beijing, which released social media content falsely claiming the group is funded by the Philippine and U.S. governments.

Philippine lawmakers and other officials consider foreign malign influence a national security threat. Senate hearings and a presidential probe into foreign election interference increased scrutiny on the sources of inauthentic content and signaled a willingness to investigate potentially foreign state-backed campaigns. Such inquiries deter covert influence operations and generate public records to contest false claims.

“The challenge for the Philippine government is to invest resources to study disinformation from China, including those from local proxies,” wrote Vitug, the Rappler editor. “It must work with experts not only from the Philippines but from friendly countries like Canada, Australia and the United States, to track down sources of false news, patterns and trends, conduct digital forensic investigation and build national digital literacy. This will enable the Philippines to come up with a more effective, data-driven response, backed by scientific information.”