Taiwan’s Strategies to Protect Democracy from Misinformation Threats

Taiwan’s Democratic Defense: Fighting Disinformation at Democracy’s Edge

“Taiwan is on the front line,” Foreign Minister Dr. Lin Chia-lung declared ahead of a recent referendum, “and we have to come up with solutions.”

This island nation, consistently ranked as a liberal democracy in international indices, faces an unprecedented challenge. Taiwan has become the target of significant pro-China misinformation and disinformation campaigns aimed at undermining public trust in elections and democratic institutions, according to multiple reports and a growing body of academic research.

Taiwan’s response has been comprehensive, involving legal reforms, civil society engagement, and educational initiatives in what officials describe as a “whole-of-society approach” to combat these threats.

In 2024, Taiwan enacted the Fraud Crime Hazard Prevention Act, which imposes substantial fines on social media platforms that fail to remove verifiably fake and intentionally misleading content. Audrey Tang, Taiwan’s cyber ambassador and former minister of digital affairs, highlighted the legislation’s immediate impact: “There are no deep fake ads anymore if you scroll on Taiwan Facebook or YouTube.”

Before the 2020 national elections, Taiwan also passed the Anti-Infiltration Act, which established criminal penalties of up to five years in prison and significant fines for individuals or entities receiving support from “hostile external forces” attempting to disrupt Taiwan’s democratic processes. The law has faced criticism from opposition parties, particularly the Kuomintang (KMT), which warns it could potentially be used in a politicized manner and infringe on fundamental rights.

Tang, however, remains cautious about content censorship or platform bans, citing Taiwan’s painful history of nearly four decades of martial law (1949-1987) when freedom of speech was severely restricted and political dissidents faced imprisonment and execution. This position aligns with U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance, who strongly opposed any form of censorship in a major speech in Munich earlier this year.

In 2022, Taiwan’s government proposed a Digital Intermediary Services Act modeled after the European Union’s Digital Services Act, but withdrew it following public concerns about potential censorship. Instead, Tang advocates for regulations promoting “freedom of movement,” pointing to Utah’s recently-enacted Digital Choice Act, which requires social media companies to allow users to transfer their personal data, including connections, to other platforms.

Taiwan’s vibrant civil society has played a crucial role in fact-checking efforts. Organizations such as the Taiwan FactCheck Center, MyGoPen, CoFacts, and Doublethink Lab have been credited with reducing the impact of misinformation through rapid response and crowdsourcing verification.

During the 2020 presidential election, Facebook established an Election Operation Center in Taiwan, working with the Central Election Commission to identify and restrict access to problematic election-related content, including voter suppression tactics and unlawful campaign activities.

Tim Niven, deputy CEO of Doublethink Lab, acknowledges fact-checking’s limitations as a reactive strategy. “The focus must be on long-term targeted strategic communications that combat narratives such as ‘democracy is chaos,'” he explained, though he concedes that breaking through echo chambers remains extremely challenging.

The Taiwanese government has also launched its own counter-narrative initiatives. Prior to the 2020 election, it implemented a public health-style campaign framing disinformation as a virus that anyone can catch but everyone can help prevent—a no-fault concept that encourages collective responsibility.

Parliamentary monitoring organization Citizen Congress Watch (CCW) takes a longer view by maintaining databases of publicly available information about legislators, including those who spread disinformation for political gain. These resources allow voters to evaluate their representatives’ performance, with high-performing legislators often using CCW endorsements in their campaigns.

Education represents another pillar in Taiwan’s strategy. In March 2023, the government released its Digital Era Media Literacy Education White Paper, incorporating “Information & Media Literacy” as one of nine core values in the national school curriculum. Tang emphasized the importance of teaching children to “navigate and steer AI and come up with their own deep research and balanced take on the state of things.”

Tang maintains that bottom-up change is essential, praising user-driven correction systems like X’s “community notes” and Meta’s similar program. “A big part of the answer to the harmful effect of disinformation on elections and democracy,” she said, “is to build bridging systems: pro-social media that elevates not the extremes, but the nuanced common ground, rarely discovered, rarely discussed common ground between people.”

As Taiwan continues to defend its democratic institutions against increasingly sophisticated disinformation campaigns, its multi-faceted approach offers potential lessons for other democracies facing similar challenges in the digital age.