A
Apoorva Devanshi
Guest
Despite Chinese direct and indirect attempts to thwart Taiwan. But nothing could prevent the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) from coming in power in Taiwan. Lai Ching-Te, got elected as president of Taiwan in elections on January 13.
Beijing was backing Lai’s closest rival, Hou Yu-Ih of the Kuomintang’s (KMT) but Lai defeated him. Ko Wen-Je of the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) was the third contender.
With Lai’s victory, his party has now held power for three consecutive terms. It has set a new record since the island nation switched to direct presidential elections in 1996. Lai, maintains President Tsai Ing-wen’s strategy which involves maintaining a strategic distance from Beijing, averting confrontation, while fortifying relations with democratic nations.
China has been trying to takeover Taiwan and for that its been using gray zone tactics and military threats. Taiwan’s Ministry of National Defense (MND) asserted that on the election day it had tracked eight Chinese military planes and six naval vessels in the island between 6 a.m. on Friday, January 12, and the same time on Saturday, January 13, Taiwan’s presidential election day.
China has been trying to influence Taiwanese elections. In fact, rather than using military threats, Beijing’s strategy has focused more on “the disinformation war” against Taiwan. Under which it aims to demoralize its 23 million citizens. Nevertheless, it appears that none of this has worked. China has been attacking Taiwan’s key information channels, both physically and digitally. Last year, Chinese fishing boat and a cargo ship severed two communications cables that connected Taiwan’s Matsu islands to the mainland. Such act of either clumsiness or sabotage have occurred at least 27 times in just the last five years.
In this election also, Chinese backed agents were targeting Taiwanese by influence campaigns and texts.
First of all, Taiwan has strong civil societies to counter this misinformation war. It established a “Taiwan fact center”. Then to counter China’s incursions into Taiwan’s information space. Taiwan’s civil society has created new organizations. A group called Cofacts allows users to forward dubious messages to a chatbot. Human editors check the messages, enter them into a database, and get back to the user with a verdict. Other digital innovations have also emerged, such as fact-checking apps for well-known social media platforms in the country.
In order to quickly scan and flag posts on social media platforms for misleading content, they have developed new artificial intelligence tools. They have been using generative A.I tools which fine tunes a language module, adds context to things on its own thus clarifying misinformation.
Then the government established a task force to keep an eye out for any indications of manipulated information surrounding the election on the Internet and in the media. The task force included representatives from the Central Election Commission, the Ministry of Justice, the Ministry of Digital Affairs, and the Ministry of Education.
Laws against alleged election meddling have also been passed in Taiwan. The Anti-Infiltration Act, for example, forbids foreign organizations from contributing to political campaigns and for using money obtained unlawfully to further political objectives. This law is currently being used by the government to thwart Beijing’s attempts to use local proxies.
It has been using the 3D’s – Deterrence, Dialogue, and De-escalation. Taiwan has been strengthening its defense by procuring arms and ammunitions. Then to reduce gray zones its been developing early warning systems. Though Taiwan is nowhere compared to China’s defense spending but it has made provisions that if china starts war in the Taiwan Strait then it will have to pay a price it cant afford. By doing so it is basically making war a costly affair. Thereby reducing, the opponents will to invade.
The most commendable antidote to Chinese provocations has been the remarkable unity and consensus displayed by all the political leaders. Regardless of their political ideologies all the three presidential candidates have been one on national security, unlike India.
They have clear stand on this matter that they will not let Taiwan become next Hong Kong. Overall in the last eight years, Taiwan under DPP has been able to avert war and been able to maneuver its way. Hope this continues under Lai’s presidency as well. Last but not the least, India should take note of Taiwan’s strategy and should take similar steps to secure its information space.
The post How Taiwan Fought Chinese Misinformation War! appeared first on The Jaipur Dialogues.
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Beijing was backing Lai’s closest rival, Hou Yu-Ih of the Kuomintang’s (KMT) but Lai defeated him. Ko Wen-Je of the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) was the third contender.
With Lai’s victory, his party has now held power for three consecutive terms. It has set a new record since the island nation switched to direct presidential elections in 1996. Lai, maintains President Tsai Ing-wen’s strategy which involves maintaining a strategic distance from Beijing, averting confrontation, while fortifying relations with democratic nations.
Misinformation War-
China has been trying to takeover Taiwan and for that its been using gray zone tactics and military threats. Taiwan’s Ministry of National Defense (MND) asserted that on the election day it had tracked eight Chinese military planes and six naval vessels in the island between 6 a.m. on Friday, January 12, and the same time on Saturday, January 13, Taiwan’s presidential election day.
China has been trying to influence Taiwanese elections. In fact, rather than using military threats, Beijing’s strategy has focused more on “the disinformation war” against Taiwan. Under which it aims to demoralize its 23 million citizens. Nevertheless, it appears that none of this has worked. China has been attacking Taiwan’s key information channels, both physically and digitally. Last year, Chinese fishing boat and a cargo ship severed two communications cables that connected Taiwan’s Matsu islands to the mainland. Such act of either clumsiness or sabotage have occurred at least 27 times in just the last five years.
In this election also, Chinese backed agents were targeting Taiwanese by influence campaigns and texts.
Taiwan’s Strategy-
First of all, Taiwan has strong civil societies to counter this misinformation war. It established a “Taiwan fact center”. Then to counter China’s incursions into Taiwan’s information space. Taiwan’s civil society has created new organizations. A group called Cofacts allows users to forward dubious messages to a chatbot. Human editors check the messages, enter them into a database, and get back to the user with a verdict. Other digital innovations have also emerged, such as fact-checking apps for well-known social media platforms in the country.
In order to quickly scan and flag posts on social media platforms for misleading content, they have developed new artificial intelligence tools. They have been using generative A.I tools which fine tunes a language module, adds context to things on its own thus clarifying misinformation.
Then the government established a task force to keep an eye out for any indications of manipulated information surrounding the election on the Internet and in the media. The task force included representatives from the Central Election Commission, the Ministry of Justice, the Ministry of Digital Affairs, and the Ministry of Education.
Laws against alleged election meddling have also been passed in Taiwan. The Anti-Infiltration Act, for example, forbids foreign organizations from contributing to political campaigns and for using money obtained unlawfully to further political objectives. This law is currently being used by the government to thwart Beijing’s attempts to use local proxies.
It has been using the 3D’s – Deterrence, Dialogue, and De-escalation. Taiwan has been strengthening its defense by procuring arms and ammunitions. Then to reduce gray zones its been developing early warning systems. Though Taiwan is nowhere compared to China’s defense spending but it has made provisions that if china starts war in the Taiwan Strait then it will have to pay a price it cant afford. By doing so it is basically making war a costly affair. Thereby reducing, the opponents will to invade.
Final Thoughts-
The most commendable antidote to Chinese provocations has been the remarkable unity and consensus displayed by all the political leaders. Regardless of their political ideologies all the three presidential candidates have been one on national security, unlike India.
They have clear stand on this matter that they will not let Taiwan become next Hong Kong. Overall in the last eight years, Taiwan under DPP has been able to avert war and been able to maneuver its way. Hope this continues under Lai’s presidency as well. Last but not the least, India should take note of Taiwan’s strategy and should take similar steps to secure its information space.
The post How Taiwan Fought Chinese Misinformation War! appeared first on The Jaipur Dialogues.
Continue reading...