How are free and fair elections ensured?
Free and fair elections are at the heart of the democratic process. Voters should be able to make their choice free from interference and manipulation. That is why the EU countries and EU institutions have several measures in place to prevent malign interference, disinformation, cyberattacks and data breaches during the European elections.
National election authorities work to ensure that the European elections are fair and free from interference and manipulation. They do this in accordance with European and national law and with the support of EU institutions.
This work includes defending the elections against potential attempts at information manipulation, cyberattacks, data breaches and hybrid threats.
When citizens vote in the European elections, the way they vote will differ from country to country. In some countries citizens vote using ballot papers, in others they can vote electronically or online.
There are established routines in place for double-checking the counting of the ballots, regardless how the vote is cast. Systems are also in place nationally to report, check and correct possible technical errors, as small irregularities and human errors may occur in every election.
The European cooperation network on elections brings together member state authorities in charge of electoral matters. Find here your country’s authorities responsible for ensuring election integrity: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden.
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Ensuring the cybersecurity of the European elections is the responsibility of each EU country.
This means protecting networks and information systems relating to the elections, as well as their users, against cyber threats that could negatively affect them, with disrupting effects for the electoral process and the voters. This could for example be hacks or cyberattacks.
Ahead of the European elections, EU countries cooperate to prepare for potential cyber threats. They are supported by EU institutions, bodies and agencies, such as the EU Agency for Cybersecurity or The Computer Emergency Response Team for the EU institutions, bodies and agencies.
Organising safe elections means handling personal data, such as name, address, date of birth or ID number of the voters.
National election authorities follow EU and national rules to ensure a high level of data protection during the European elections. This includes protection of personal data against unauthorised or unlawful processing and accidental loss.
Disinformation is content that is deliberately manipulated and disseminated with the intention to deceive or fool an audience in order to achieve certain strategic, political or economic goals. This could for example be to undermine trust in democratic institutions, processes or elections or to influence election results.
Disinformation does not need to be completely fake or fabricated. Manipulation can take many forms. Often it relies on presenting information or content out of context, accompanying them with a misleading headline or photo or presenting real content as something it is not.
Disinformation can be a threat to society because it can undermine democracy, distort democratic debate, polarise society and make it difficult for citizens to make their democratic choice free from interference and manipulation.
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Take a step back and think before you share! Disinformation is fuelled by people pushing the share or like button too fast and maybe without having even read what they are about to share.
Disinformation often relies on one of these techniques to convince people to share it:
- it triggers strong feelings - such as anger, outrage, fear or greed;
- it is very polarising;
- it seems ”too good or too bad to be true”.
Check out the factsheet “How to spot when news is fake” for tips and tricks.
EU institutions, civil society and others are working in several ways to counter disinformation. Find out more here:
- The European Parliament’s website about disinformation
- The European Commission’s website about disinformation
- The European External Action Service’s website about disinformation
- The East Stratcom Task Force’s website EUvsDisinfo
- The European Digital Media Observatory (EDMO) brings together fact-checkers, media literacy experts and academic researchers to analyse and counter disinformation. EDMO has hubs covering all EU countries
- List of national fact-checkers: European Fact-Checking Standards Network (EFCSN)