New Delhi:
Tech giants and social media platforms must make their algorithms transparent amid allegations over foreign interference and ideological bias, BJP IT cell chief Amit Malviya told NDTV today. He told NDTV’s Shiv Aroor that foreign platforms are acting with a lack of transparency and many nations are challenging tech companies for unilaterally interfering in domestic matters.
“When it comes to other countries, whether it’s the European Union, the UK or even South Asian countries, in the past there have been several instances where those sovereign nations have risen up against these tech platforms,” Malviya said. “These platforms have unilaterally taken a certain editorial position which was interfering with the public discourse in the countries that they were operating in.”
NDTV’s data analysis on social media reach had raised questions over how protests at Delhi’s Jantar Mantar got massive algorithmic boosts, while student demonstrations in Jharkhand were muted online. Tech firms routinely attribute such disparities strictly to the function of their algorithms.
However, Malviya said there is clear evidence of data manipulation. “Your report highlighted how the protests at Jantar Mantar were hyped up and the one happening in Jharkhand which is actually led by genuine students did not find the same traction,” he said.
He pointed out the recent visit by Meta’s top executives to India and their admission of lapses, including agreeing to the fact that “a large part of the campaign was sponsored and was sponsored perhaps by people who are not sitting here in India.”
Malviya said advertisements on Meta platforms like Facebook and Instagram are frequently sponsored from neighbouring countries and targeted at Indian audiences. “We do not know who those people are. We don’t know what their intentions are,” he added.
The BJP leader rubbished the tech industry’s standard defence on questions about algorithms.
“What is an algorithm? Somebody is writing those algorithms. And clearly those are human beings. If you write a certain code which is not transparent and users cannot see it, then clearly you can hide behind algorithms and say that these are non-partisan strings, but that is never the case,” Malviya said.
He recalled, for example, how Twitter (now X) documents made public following the takeover by Elon Musk showed a different picture. “A huge volume of information was put out for the people to consume where it was made obvious that Twitter under Jack Dorsey was manipulating users,” Malviya said, adding the platform under the previous owner was “shadow banning”, prioritising specific content and allowing “ideological biases” to play out.
“We see that happen with Meta also. They can continue to deny, but the proof of the pudding is in what we are seeing out there and it is quite obvious that they are taking positions or they are allowing people without checking their bonafides to promote certain content which could be in their interest, it could be serving the deep state’s interest, it could be serving interests of people inimical to India’s interest,” Malviya said.
He raised concerns over what he called the unchecked rise of artificial intelligence. He said the government had ordered all tech platforms to identify AI-generated material, but many have not done it.
“On the one hand they claim to be technology companies and are failing in addressing technology issues. On the other hand they claim that they are intermediaries but they constantly editorialise. So there is a lot of contradiction in what they say and what they are doing. It’s not just limited to India,” he told NDTV.
Malviya indicated nations may eventually have to rely on their own domestic tech infrastructure to prevent foreign manipulation. “These tech companies that already have dominant positions have to be made more accountable and perhaps countries need to build indigenous platforms so that we know that we are in control of our democracy, our discourse and it is not influenced by foreign money or foreign interest,” he said.
