AI chatbots have been shown to be “inaccurate and evidently prejudiced” when providing election recommendations, the Dutch data protection authority (AP) has stated, raising alarms about a potential threat to democracy just over a week before the country’s general election.
Testing Reveals Consistent Bias in Chatbot Recommendations
The quartet of AI assistants evaluated by the AP “frequently recommend identical two parties”, irrespective of the voter’s inquiry or input, the watchdog explained in a analysis published ahead of the late October vote.
In more than half of the cases, the AI recommended either the far-right Freedom party (PVV) of the politician Geert Wilders or the leftwing GroenLinks-PvdA headed by the ex-EU commissioner Frans Timmermans.
Certain groups, such as the centre-right CDA, “are almost never mentioned”, even when the user’s input precisely aligns with the positions of these parties, the study pointed out.
Official Warns Against Using AI Chatbots for Voting Guidance
The vice-chair of the data protection agency, Monique Verdier, stated that while AI assistants appear to be smart resources, “as a voting aid, they consistently fail”. Citizens were being steered toward a party that did not necessarily align with their political views, she added.
“This immediately affects a fundamental pillar of democracy: the integrity of free and fair elections,” said Verdier. “We thus caution against using AI chatbots for election recommendations, as their functioning is opaque and hard to confirm.”
Election Context and Political Landscape
Netherlands citizens vote on 29 October in an electoral contest that will be keenly observed around Europe for the performance of the Freedom party.
The far-right party of Geert Wilders is ahead in surveys but the gap to the GroenLinks-PvdA and CDA seems to be closing, with many voters still undecided.
All major parties have rejected a coalition with the Freedom party, meaning the runner-up party is highly probable to provide the next prime minister.
Inadvertent Prejudice Attributed 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.
