AI chatbots have been shown to be “inaccurate and evidently prejudiced” when providing election recommendations, the Netherlands’ data watchdog has reported, raising alarms about a potential threat to democratic processes just over a week before national elections.
Study Shows Repeated Partiality in Chatbot Recommendations
The four chatbots tested by the AP “often end up with the same two parties”, regardless of the user’s question or command, the regulator explained in a report published ahead of the late October vote.
For over 50% of instances, the chatbot suggested either the right-wing PVV of the politician Geert Wilders or the leftwing GroenLinks-PvdA led by the former European Commission vice-president Frans Timmermans.
Certain groups, such as the moderate CDA, “are almost never mentioned”, even when the voter’s query exactly matches the stances of these parties, the report pointed out.
Authority Figure Cautions Against Using AI Chatbots for Voting Guidance
The vice-chair of the AP, Monique Verdier, stated that while chatbots may seem like clever tools, “as a voting aid, they consistently fail”. Voters were being pushed toward a political group that did not necessarily align with their ideological beliefs, she added.
“This directly impacts a cornerstone of democracy: the integrity of free and fair elections,” Verdier stated. “We thus caution against employing AI assistants for voting advice, as their functioning is opaque and difficult to verify.”
Voting Background and Party Dynamics
The Dutch head to the polls on 29 October in an election that will be keenly observed across the continent for the showing of the Freedom party.
The right-leaning group of Wilders is ahead in surveys but the gap to the left-wing and centre-right parties seems to be closing, with many voters still undecided.
Every significant political faction have ruled out an alliance with the Freedom party, meaning the party that comes second is most likely to provide the next prime minister.
Inadvertent Prejudice Linked to Chatbot Functioning
The AP stressed that the bots were not deliberately biased, and that their “identified shortcomings” are a result of the way AI chatbots operate.
