In favor of Hillary: why Trump accuses Google of manipulating the presidential election

U.S. President Donald Trump accuses Google of manipulating voters in favor of Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election.

“Wow, the report just came out! During the 2016 election, Google manipulated 2.6 to 16 million voters in favor of Hillary Clinton! The information is made public by a Clinton supporter, not Trump! Google should sue. My victory was even larger than anticipated! ”, The president wrote on his Twitter.

Wow, Report Just Out! Google manipulated from 2.6 million to 16 million votes for Hillary Clinton in 2016 Election! This was put out by a Clinton supporter, not a Trump Supporter! Google should be sued. My victory was even bigger than thought! @JudicialWatch

Although the American leader did not specify what kind of “report” he was talking about, the media say that most likely this refers to the study of the American psychologist Robert Epstein, a researcher at the American Institute for Behavioral Research and Technology and former chief editor of Psychology Today. It was discussed Monday morning, August 19, on Fox Business.

Epstein claims Google was biased in favor of Hillary Clinton in 2016. He himself, according to him, is a supporter of the Democratic Party and voted for Clinton.

Manipulation elements

The study announced by the American president is not new. In March 2017, Epstein and his colleagues presented it at the international symposium of psychologists in Vienna. It states that in 2016, the Google search engine, showing results on topics related to US elections, showed a frank bias in favor of one of the candidates.

“After examining a sample of 4045 search queries about the choices made by users of the Firefox browser on the Google and Yahoo search engines in a twenty-five day period from October 15 to November 8 (election day), we found that the average search results for the entire indicated period showed bias in the benefit of Hillary Clinton, ”the study emphasizes.

It is noted that the “level of bias in favor of Clinton”, “in the case of Google (0.19), more than doubled this indicator with Yahoo (0.09). The difference between these two values ​​is of high statistical significance. ”

Moreover, the researchers found that after the election, the level of bias in the issuance of Google decreased.

• Screenshot of a graph of changes in bias in Google SERPs from a report by Robert Epstein
• © https://aibrt.org

When asked whether bias in the issuance of Google influenced the election results, they say yes. In particular, it is noted that back in February 2016, Epstein predicted that Google algorithms could give Clinton an additional 2.6 million votes. In the 2016 elections, Trump won the number of electors from the states (which is why he became president), but Clinton’s margin in the total number of votes cast only slightly exceeded Epstein’s forecast figure of 2.86 million.

According to the authors of the study, “it is possible that without the bias of the Google search results in favor of Clinton,” she would have “won” in the number of votes cast for her “with only a slight margin”.

On August 19, according to CNN, Robert Epstein told the channel that Proclinton sentiment on Google could lead from 2.6 to 10.4 million voters to the side of a Democratic candidate. At the same time, CNN, referring to the opinion of the researcher, accuses Trump of “falsely” accusing Google of “manipulation”. However, Epstein himself uses this word in his report. In his opinion, the bias in the delivery of information Google demonstrates the "Manipulation effect of search engines" (Search Engine Manipulation Effect (SEME)). On July 16, speaking on the same subject in the US Congress, the scientist again used the term “manipulation”.

“There is growing evidence that Google is beginning to manipulate people's thoughts and behavior after the first character entered in the search bar,” the researcher notes.

• An example of the bias of search engines cited by Robert Epstein. Screenshot from the report
• © https://aibrt.org

Epstein bases his opinion not only on the results of a 2016 study, but also on his previous works, including, for example, the influence of search engines on voting in India and Australia. It was then developed methodology that formed the basis of the study of the impact on elections in the United States.

More dangerous than “Russian intervention”

According to the scientist, the influence of Google and other major US companies operating in cyberspace on American elections and voter behavior is much more dangerous than “Russian interference”.

“I believe that Russian intervention - despite the fact that it is unacceptable and cannot but disturb - does not pull votes in large numbers. Advertising and news stories are competitive and visible, like billboards; while the ephemeral effects I have studied are invisible and non-competitive. They are completely controlled by technology giants, and there is no way to resist them, ”Epstein told the Senate.

In particular, according to Epstein's estimates, which he reported to US senators, during the interim campaign of 2018, Google could influence the position of up to 78.2 million voters, incline them to choose candidates from one of the party. It is understood that we are talking about democrats.

Robert Epstein’s allegations aren’t the only ones Google faces. Google (as well as Twitter and Facebook) was often criticized by Donald Trump for his bias. In June, a $ 50 million lawsuit against the company was filed by a Democratic candidate, Hawaii congressman Tulsi Gabbard, who advocated revising US foreign policy and refusing to intervene in other countries. Google has blocked her campaign account for campaigning and fundraising.

In a July interview with Project Veritas, Google’s senior software engineer, Greg Coppola, said the company was manipulating search engine information for Donald Trump’s adversaries. According to him, the company's activities can be called "interference in the US election." According to Project Veritas, the company also developed a media ranking system that allowed to lower the “confidence rating” of non-mainstream media, including RT.

This is not the only case of the tech giant’s special relationship with RT. In May 2019, the Google-owned YouTube service refused to give the “RT in Russian” symbolic “golden button” to the channel after the number of its subscribers exceeded 1 million. Prior to this, YouTube introduced a special labeling for the channel’s video products, warning that it was “completely or partially funded by the Russian government. ”

"The actual monopolist"

As political analyst Alexander Asafov noted in an interview with RT, accusations against Google of bias and manipulation of public opinion are fair.

“The very mechanism of using big data on user preferences by large information corporations is a fact. And Google in this case is actually a monopolist in this area, ”said Asafov.

In addition, according to him, the very attempts to "divide the media into reliable and unreliable raises a lot of questions." So in the lists of reliable media, as a rule, there are media that are “directly or indirectly controlled by Trump’s political opponents.”

However, according to the political scientist, it will be quite difficult to prove manipulation in the courts, as Trump urges. One thing is the calculations of scientists, the other is evidence that must be brought to court.

In turn, Moscow State University professor Andrei Manoilo believes that Trump is ready to use every opportunity to launch a political attack on his opponents. According to the expert, the mainstream media, which issue mainly anti-trump information, could also influence the search results.

“The American media belong to specific media moguls who are associated either with one party or with another. If Trump is from the Republican Party, then the media moguls of the Democratic Party will not support him. In addition, during the election campaign, Trump offended Republican politician Jeb Bush, so many, even the republican media, do not support him now. There is such a separation in the media, and there is no need to conduct a study to open it, ”said RT Manoilo.

Kirill Koktysh, an associate professor at MGIMO, agrees with the thesis of bias on mainstream media. However, he said, search engines also contribute to the manipulation of voters.

“The accusations are fully justified, since manipulating the delivery of results is quite natural,” Koktysh said in an interview with RT.

"The tool for the formation of public opinion"

According to Robert Epstein, Google may have influenced election results in more than 25% of cases worldwide, at least since 2015. The fact that American technology giants can actively influence elections outside the United States, agrees Alexander Asafov.

“Modern technology is used for political interference not only in US elections, but also in other countries,” Asafov said. - This is done by YouTube and Twitter. The companies themselves deny this, but this is a fact. ”

On August 11, 2019, Roskomnadzor demanded that Google ban advertising of illegal actions on YouTube, noting that in case of refusal, the company's position would be perceived as "interference in the sovereign affairs of the state, as well as hostile influence and obstruction of the holding of democratic elections in Russia."

According to experts, in the United States before 2020, attempts will also be recorded to manipulate the opinion of the voter using the potential of information technology.

In turn, MSU professor Andrei Manoilo noted in an interview with RT that it is not yet clear "how they will use these algorithms."

“The question is whether they will be used as a tool for shaping public opinion or whether it will be formed as a result of user preferences, and algorithms will only strengthen these preferences,” said RT expert.

Kirill Koktysh, however, believes that these technologies will have less impact on Trump voters.

“As the 2016 elections showed, Trump voters sit on social networks a little, are not much affected by the pressure of mainstream media, and therefore are completely autonomous in their behavior. That is, Google, of course, influenced the voters, but he campaigned more likely for those who would not have voted for Trump anyway, ”the political analyst believes. “I think other channels of information will appear.”