Securing the Vote: Threats to Anglo-American Democracy
The constantly changing complexity of data, online information, and social networks has rendered modern democracies greatly vulnerable to illegitimate influence. Malicious actors have developed several techniques of interfering in elections, ranging from information manipulation and dissemination through legitimate channels, to cyberattacks that access personal information or disrupt infrastructure.
Failure to act on addressing these threats is leading to a loss of trust in democratic institutions, carrying long-term impacts that shape the environment in which governments and businesses operate. Ultimately, businesses need a reliable political environment to ensure that operations remain smooth and employees can enjoy the benefits of job security and stable income. To best preserve this necessary trust, it is essential that business and government put resources behind understanding the nature of contemporary disinformation and cyber threats and develop proactive responses to them.
BritishAmerican Business’ latest insight piece comes from Akshat Dhankher, a co-op student from Northeastern University who assisted the BAB London Policy Team between Summer-Winter 2019.
Find out more about the technologies threatening democracies across the world, in particular the transatlantic relationship, and the solutions being developed to fight back.
This piece serves as a follow-on to a roundtable event of the same name, ‘Securing the Vote: Cyberthreats to Anglo-American Democracy’, run by BritishAmerican Business in London on December 2, 2019.