EFF and Allies on Brazil's Elections: Privacy

What happened

EFF, Access Now, and Data Privacy Brasil are putting forward recommendations to strengthen robust privacy and data protection safeguards in the context of Brazil's elections. The recommendations stress the close relationship between violations of personal data protection and challenges to the integrity of electoral processes.

By having access to massive amounts of personal information, these companies have the ability to shape the content that users see and interact with. This happens through the construction of profiles that can reveal habits, social relationships, political preferences, and opinions, to mention a few examples. Personal data is the fuel that amplifies risks to the integrity of the electoral process.

That’s true whether it’s provided by the users themselves or generated by the platforms from their interactions online. For disinformation actors, access to sophisticated tools—such as those used to create "deepfakes" through generative AI, or "bots" programmed to spread content and seek to manipulate public opinion—boosts the effectiveness of this microtargeting in terms of quality and scalability, making it harder to detect as false or manipulative content.

AI-generated avatars and synthetic characters that simulate voters, influencers, hosts, commentators, or community leaders can produce footage that appears spontaneous, fabricate the voices of artificial political actors, and make it harder for users to identify if a given public statement was created or mediated by technology.

In this context, paid promotion with nanotargeting seeks to reach increasingly specific profiles with customized content, and AI-based tools are used to assess and map its impact on social networks. Drawing on the personal data of groups of voters, profiles of "synthetic voters" are created to test messages or strategies in search of the most efficient way to influence real voters.

Why it matters

They underscore how privacy and data protection guarantees are a crucial tool for curbing the targeted spread of false or manipulative content and other problematic strategies used by political actors that are amplified by digital technologies such as artificial intelligence systems. The recommendations are part of a broader regional initiative and build on the legal and institutional safeguards already in place in Brazil.

They seek to promote greater coordination among oversight institutions, civil society, and digital platforms, and encourage the solid implementation of privacy and data protection guarantees as drivers of electoral integrity. Read the full document below. Protecting the integrity of the electoral process in the face of internet and social media use is a challenge that many policymakers are addressing or are willing to address.

Online, content that can affect the integrity of the electoral process is increasingly personalized. This phenomenon is so concerning that it has been identified as one of the main global short- and medium-term risks. In an era of generative AI, the economic cost and technical difficulty of producing and spreading false or synthetic content to deceive, manipulate, or simulate authenticity have been considerably reduced.

That intensifies concern over the integrity of the electoral process. Meanwhile, online privacy and personal data protection remain unfinished business in Latin America. There is an intrinsic connection between the ability to collect and process large amounts of personal data and the way false or manipulative content is created and distributed—on social media and messaging apps in particular, and on the internet in general.

For this reason, applying strict laws and policies on personal data protection and privacy makes it possible to reduce the impact of false or manipulative content. This is especially important in electoral contexts, where such content affects and impoverishes public debate, directly affecting political and electoral rights and the integrity of the electoral process. This phenomenon predates the emergence of the internet.

However, the rise of new technologies accelerates the generation and spread of false and manipulative content. This is supported by the very economic model that sustains the platforms, amplifying its effectiveness and reach. On the one hand, social media platforms have content recommendation algorithms that use personal data to generate profiles to which they can then serve targeted advertising content, including explicitly political propaganda.

" Political microtargeting seeks to have a direct or indirect impact on democracy. It is used to persuade voters, to encourage or discourage turnout at the polls, or to raise funds using information that is deliberately taken out of context, inaccurate, or erroneous. The control exercised by these companies raises serious concerns about people's rights.

What to watch

This rapid expansion of AI systems and hyper-personalization with data can lead to a problem of "epistemic erosion" for democratic societies, as pointed out by the UN's Independent Scientific Panel on AI Governance in 2026.

At Access Now, Data Privacy Brasil, and the Electronic Frontier Foundation, we point to the enforcement of personal data protection laws and public privacy policies as an efficient mechanism for improving the quality of our democracies and reducing the manipulation of public discourse in digital environments and its impact in electoral contexts.