Just a month after Imran Khan’s party Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) used artificial intelligence (AI) to generate an audio voice of incarcerated former Prime Minister Imran Khan for an online rally, social media platforms is now flooded with AI-produced voiceovers of various political figures.
From AI-composed songs to promotional images, the surge of free AI voice-cloning and image-editing tools has turned electioneering into a continuous flow of campaign materials via AI, introducing a noble playbook for digital politics.
Past national elections have highlighted the surging trend sophisticated digital political campaigns, using tactics such as creating bogus accounts, running targeted hashtag trends, developing customized mobile apps, as well as staging grand social media “conventions”. With Pakistan heading into its biggest digital election in February, political parties are excited to push the boundaries and explore different ways to wage the technology’s recent intrusion into politics.
“We used AI to create content for Nawaz Sharif’s arrival campaign ahead of his Minar-i-Pakistan political jalsa in October,” Muzakir Ijaz, a digital media consultant leading PML-N’s digital strategy, Dawn reported
There is a difference between reality and AI-generated content. We had to go over 36 iterations in Urdu to reach 65pc diction accuracy. People can tell it’s not real —Jibran Ilyas, PTI’s social media leader said.
“AI is useful for generating image content but it is not good at integrating Urdu yet so our use is limited,” said Ijaz, adding that he onboarded a team of 30 digital media professionals to support PML-N’s election campaigning.
While the use of AI may be costly-efficient for social media teams, who would otherwise require expensive experts to analyse data and create promotional campaigns, the dissemination implications may be shocking.
Last year, an edited video of Imran Khan reportedly showed him with his eyes closed, sending shock wave to his supporters about his treatment in prison. The 26-second clip was posted on X, formerly known as Twitter, where it received more than 500 shares. An AFP fact-check found that the edited video appeared to use a “closed-eyes filter”, which gave the illusion that Khan’s eyes were shut.
“The implications of AI use are worrying,” said Nighat Dad, Executive Director of the Digital Rights Foundation (DRF). “Political parties are using AI to influence the choice of voters who are not digitally literate and politically charged. How will they differiante what is genuine media and what is AI media?”
Ms Dad, who is also a member of the UN’s Advisory Body on AI, questioned about ethics on the use of AI were yet unanswered. “In this context, the use of AI can lead to erosion of the public’s trust in the integrity of the information they consume,” she said.
“The good thing is there is a difference between reality and AI-generated content,” Jibran Ilyas, PTI’s social media lead told Dawn.
“We had to go over 36 iterations in Urdu to reach 65pc diction accuracy. People can tell it’s not real,” he said.
Ilyas said PTI was aware of AI’s use and added a clear disclaimer to Khan’s online rally audio flagging it as the “AI voice of Imran Khan based on his notes”.
“We are discovering a lot of ways to use AI but also considering ethics. We might consider another Khan speech right before the polling day,” he said, adding that the party would be focusing on TikTok for the days heading to the elections given its popularity among the youth and rural areas.
Digital literacy
The number of internet users in Pakistan grown rapidly since the last national elections in 2018. According to PTA, in 2018, there were 55 million mobile broadband subscribers and 58 million broadband internet users, but by November 2023, there were 126 million mobile broadband users and 129 million broadband internet users (54 per cent of the population).
With the high growth in digital access, the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has for the first time extended its code of conduct for national elections to digital media and social media influencers. The code prohibits the dissemination of content that is prejudicial to Pakistan’s ideology, sovereignty, dignity, or security, or that harms national solidarity or creates law and order problems.
Despite working with tech platforms on digital literacy initiatives in heading to the polls, the Pakistan poll body does not offer any guidelines or accountability on the funding and responsible use of technology by political parties for campaigning.
According to the latest study on how university students understand disinformation by Freedom Network for the Coalition Against Disinformation (CAD), most young people (63pc of the respondents) believe they come across disinformation on the Internet every day and that disinformation poses a threat to democracy and elections (62pc).
“The value of fact has eroded,” said Amber Rahim Shamsi, Director of the Center of Excellence in Journalism (CEJ) at the Institute of Business Administration (IBA) lahore .“We we held digital literacy workshops in 13 universities for 800 students around Pakistan. Across the board, we discovered young people are still not capable of identifying the difference between fact and propaganda,” she said.
Shamsi and her team recently launched a non-partisan fact-checking initiative, iVerify, to advance the scope of independent and unbiased reporting in the country’s journalistic landscape. “Since 2018, media organisations have become more conscious of fact-checking. However, none of the students we spoke to are aware of these [fact-checking] efforts. There is still a lot that needs to be done.”