REPORT – Electoral Integrity and Political Microtargeting: Monitoring European elections 2024 in Spain

This research paper by the Xnet was prepared as a contribution to the project ‘Electoral Integrity and Political Microtargeting: An Evidence-Based Analysis in Six EU Member States’, coordinated by the Civil Liberties Union for Europe (Liberties). |Author org is – put here your own intro in 1 sentence|. Liberties is a Berlin-based civil liberties network organisation that protects democracy through EU-wide human and digital rights campaigns.

The research project monitored online political advertising in the run-up to the 2024 European Parliament elections in six EU countries: Bulgaria (BHC), France (VoxPublic), Germany (Reset Tech), Hungary (HCLU), Poland (PAF) and Spain (Xnet), supported by Who Targets Me (WTM) as technical partner. The project relied primarily on data collected during the European Parliamentary elections campaign from political advertisements promoted on Facebook by political entities. Researchers scrutinised whether political actors follow national campaigning rules and European data protection rules by examining data voluntarily donated by citizens through a privacy-friendly desktop browser extension.

Any views and opinions expressed by the author of this research paper are solely those of the author and do not reflect the views and opinions of Liberties or the co-funders.

REPORT – Electoral Integrity and Political Microtargeting: Monitoring European elections 2024 in Spain
Author: Xnet, Institute for Democratic Digitalisation, for the EU coalition leaded
by Liberties and Who Targets Me
 

Xnet, Institute for Democratic Digitalisation and its work on disinformation

Xnet participates to this project in the context of its research and campaign on disinformation that starts in 2018.

The more recent results of it can be found in the book:

Simona Levi et al.

Fake You – An Activist’s Guide to Defeating Disinformation

Don’t blame the people; don’t blame the Internet. Blame the power.

Governments, political parties, mass media, large corporations and fortunes: the monopolies of information manipulation and the threats to freedom of expres-sion.

“This is THE activist’s guide to defeating fake news and blocking policies that use disinfor-mation to curtail civil rights and freedoms.
Power has lied to us since the beginning of time. The methods and technologies used have differed, but lying is in power’s DNA. In the institutional agenda, disinformation is used to say that the problem is with us (as usual) but, in fact, it’s with them. We have had enough. This book shows how and why power has always created disinfor-mation and how today’s fake news is just that same age-old lie and propaganda going by a different name.
We provide rock-solid solutions: first, more democracy, and second, a brand new systemic la-belling method.”

In free download here: https://xnet-x.net/en/fakeyou-disinformation-free-download/

This book is the update of the Spanish version from 2019 [title translated ->] #FakeYou – Fake News and Disinformation – Governments, political parties, mass media, large corporations and fortunes: the monopolies of information manipulation and the threats to freedom of expression.
– Editorial Rayo Verde.


Spain: country context

Political and electoral landscape in Spain

The Duverger Law, which posits that a country’s electoral system influences its party system, is manifested in Spain in a nuanced way. Although Spain’s proportional system should theoretically favor a multiparty landscape, in practice, it presents certain “traps”* that lead to an imperfect bipartisanship. Traditionally, this system has been dominated by two main parties on the left-right axis: the Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party (PSOE) on the left and the People’s Party (PP) on the right, each supported by what could be called “crutch parties”: two smaller parties that can tilt the balance in government formation processes.

Additionally, the situation is complicated by the country’s second political axis, which contrasts centralist nationalism with peripheral nationalism. This axis has led to distinct party subsystems in various regions, such as Catalonia and the Basque Country, and significant parties in other regions.

After the 15M, known as the Indignados movement that emerged in Spain in 2011 as a massive protest against austerity measures, political corruption, and lack of effective representation, a relative upheaval occurred in Spain’s party system. This anti-bipartisanship and anti-party movement, which called for reforms to deepen democracy, was supported by 80% of the population, and initiatives like Aritmetica20n, launched during the electoral campaign, garnered hundreds of thousands of visits within hours. This upheaval was initially capitalized on by Podemos for its own benefit, but it also disbanded, betraying its main demands and prematurely ending the protest cycle. Following its decline, its splinter group Sumar emerged, as well as far-right formations that the party Ciudadanos had opened the door to on its side of the political spectrum. However, despite this initial change in the political landscape, no substantial modifications were made to the electoral law to support a lasting transformation of the party system. Over the past decade, the system has progressively readjusted towards an imperfect bipartisanship scenario, where the two major parties remain central to Spanish politics, although now more visibly accompanied by “crutch parties.”

On the centralist nationalism-peripheral nationalism axis, a certain upheaval also occurred in the last decade. Following the 2017 Catalonia independence referendum, some parties within Catalonia’s party subsystem were “outlawed,” being excluded from the state alliance system, and some of their representatives were imprisoned or went into exile. As a result, until 2023, no government could articulate a clear parliamentary majority, generating relative instability in a political system accustomed to absolute or comfortable governing majorities.

*In Spain, there are ‘shielded’ electoral districts. These are sparsely populated areas that are overrepresented electorally by law. In these districts, it is traditionally almost impossible for any party other than the two major ones to gain representation in the allocation of seats, which follows the D’Hondt system. This situation forces voters to opt for the so-called ‘useful vote’ or risk ‘wasting their vote’ by choosing a minority party. The only ones who can circumvent this dynamic are nationalist parties that concentrate their vote in specific districts.
 

Media landscape in Spain

Early in life I have noticed that no event is ever correctly reported in a newspaper, but in Spain, for the first time, I saw newspaper reports which did not bear any relation to the facts, not even the relationship which is implied in an ordinary lie. I saw great battles reported where there had been no fighting, and complete silence where hundreds of men had been killed. I saw troops who had fought bravely denounced as cowards and traitors, and others who had never seen a shot fired hailed as the heroes of imaginary victories, and I saw newspapers… …retailing these lies and eager intellectuals building emotional superstructures over events that had never happened. I saw, in fact, history being written not in terms of what happened but of what ought to have happened according to various ‘party lines’.

This quote of George Orwell from Looking Back on the Spanish War (1943) is still valid for Spain.
Here are some key aspects of the Spanish media landscape:

1. Television:
• Public Broadcasters: The main public broadcaster is Radiotelevisión Española (RTVE), which operates channels such as La 1, La 2, and the 24-hour news channel Canal 24 Horas. Obsolete intertainment, not appeling.
• Private Broadcasters: Major private TV networks include Atresmedia (which operates Antena 3 and La Sexta) and Mediaset España (which operates Telecinco and Cuatro). These networks dominate the television market and offer a mix of news, entertainment, and sports. Baised and law quality and verification.
• Regional Channels: Each autonomous community in Spain has its own public television channels, such as TV3 in Catalonia and Telemadrid in Madrid.

2. Radio:
• Public Radio: RTVE also operates several radio stations, including Radio Nacional de España (RNE), which offers news, talk shows, and cultural program-ming.
• Private Radio: Prominent private radio networks include Cadena SER, COPE, and Onda Cero, each providing a range of news, sports, and entertainment pro-grams.

3. Print Media:
• National Newspapers: Major national newspapers include El País, El Mundo, ABC, and La Vanguardia. These papers have traditionally played a significant role in Spanish public life and politics.
• Regional Newspapers: There are also influential regional newspapers, such as El Periódico de Catalunya, La Voz de Galicia, and Levante-EMV.
• Sports Newspapers: Newspapers dedicated to sports, such as Marca, AS, and Sport, are highly popular, reflecting the country’s strong interest in sports foot-ball. They have sections on politics os many people just get informed through them.

4. Digital Media:
• Online News: Many traditional media outlets have robust online presences. Additionally, purely digital news platforms such as El Confidencial, Eldiario.es, and Público have gained significant readership.

5. Social Media: Social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and Tiktok are widely used for news consumption and distribution.

6. Media Ownership:
• Media ownership in Spain is concentrated among a few major groups, which can influence editorial lines and perspectives. For instance, Atresmedia and Mediaset España dominate the television sector, while Grupo Prisa, Unidad Editorial, and Vocento are influential in print and online media.

7. Challenges:
• Economic Pressures: The media industry in Spain faces economic challenges, including declining print sales and advertising revenue, which have been exacer-bated by the digital transition.
• Political Polarization: Media outlets in Spain often have clear political align-ments, which can lead to polarized coverage and influence public opinion. Mostly baised and low quality and verification.

First, we want to say it out loud: there is still good journalism: investigative reliable journalism, indispensable journalism.
That said, what is going on with the sector?(1) It is worth mentioning(2) that in the 1980s a business management model, the Rupert Murdoch model, which consisted of turning journalism into just another business dedicated mainly to recycling information to reduce costs, arrived. In Spain the model has been massively embraced, also from “serious” and reputated media. On top of that, media now have to compete for advertising revenues with the online advertising and platform giants, adding to previous biases new ones brought about by the new advertising market(3). And now, we see a variable becoming increasingly amplified: political interference, through the financing of the media with institutional advertising. Due to the loss of advertising revenues because of competition in the digital arena, the vulnerability of the media has increased its dependence on different parties. There is a severe and non-democratic concentration of ownership of the mainstream media(4,5).

The existence of apparently more diverse and pluralistic media offerings does not necessarily mean that this is actually the case. It is quite normal for a single media conglomerate to have both a left-wing and a right-wing TV channel to cover all audiences, enclosing them in either a left wing or a right-wing bubble and then providing both with the same advertisements and political propaganda tailored to their tastes(6,7).

The outlook is even more serious if we take into account the fact that, following the financial crisis, the media concentrated into the hands of large financial conglomerates – mainly the banks, corporations or high-wealth individuals to which they owed money – and have, therefore lost all independence in some systemic fields, such as the financial system:

– Group Prisa – El País is partly of Banco Santander and HSBC
– Group Vocento – Abc is partly of Banco Santander and BBVA
– Group Unidad Editorial – ElMundo is partly of Intesa Sanpaolo
– Group La Razón – Atresmedia is partly of Banco Sabadell
– Group Godó – La Vanguardia is partly of Caixabank
– Group Zeta – El Periódico is partly of Caixabank

The journalistic code of ethics(8) is merely a guideline and not an obligation. Several media outlets have increasingly seen that fabricating information is more profitable than actual investigation or reporting. We have seen a proliferation of headlines created ad hoc, which, under the guise of media, are little more than channels of propaganda for the fabrication of biased news that may or may not be based on news items.

This shift only accentuates the tendency for many media outlets to engage in unverified replication of information passed down by governments and political parties as if they were reliable. In this context, the good independent media struggle. It is not uncommon to find information published in the mass media that has not even undergone a simple verification exercise available to anyone in the digital age, such as a search on a search engine.
A recent report (June 2024) shows for the first time the governmental spending in media and the unbalance we are talking about. It is not related to left or right. It is related of the power each media has established in building a very polarised society.

The role of social media in political campaigns in Spain

The advent of social media has been one of the foundational elements of the Spanish political cycle that began with the 15M movement. Twitter, in particular, became a key tool for citizen self-organization and mobilization, enabling rapid and effective communication among participants and facilitating the coordination of demonstrations and events in real-time. The use of social media by the 15M not only helped change public discourse, amplifying voices and opinions traditionally excluded from conventional media, but also demonstrated the power of these platforms to influence the political and social agenda.

Partly in reaction to this explosion of social media and the threat it posed to their political position, television in Spain responded by elevating a series of television personalities, known as tertulianos (such as Judge Elpidio Silva, Albert Rivera, or Pablo Iglesias), to whom they provided a powerful media platform even after they became electoral candidates for tailor-made projects. To co-opt the legitimacy of the 15M and capitalize on its success, or simply to ride its momentum, these new political parties tried to justify their rise as a result of social media use. However, in reality, social media played an auxiliary role within a broader phenomenon of “social television.”

As the waters have returned to the course of imperfect bipartisanship, television has reconsolidated its dominant political position, creating a new political content offer that did not exist before the 15M. Regarding newspapers, the crisis in the sector has been so severe that they exist exclusively thanks to government aid and institutional advertising. Both the major historical headlines and the myriad of digital media have become mere clientelist appendages of the central or regional governments in office. This economic dependence has significantly compromised their editorial independence, affecting the quality and objectivity of the information they offer and, above all, the trust and attention of the citizenry.

Like the rest of Europe and much of the world, Facebook has been a key tool for political campaigns in Spain for many years due to its broad user base and its capability and ease in selling ad segmentation. Despite the prominence of Twitter in Spain, Facebook continues to have a larger user base, especially when including Instagram, the most used social network in Spain in 2023. Political parties and candidates have used Facebook to direct specific messages to different demographic groups, promote events, disseminate news, and mobilize their followers.

Unlike other countries in the world, Facebook has not been the subject of major controversies or scandals in Spain beyond international news. Its role in spreading fake news and its influence on political polarization has been questioned. Despite these concerns, it remains a central platform in the communication strategy of political parties, which, unlike Twitter, can use it as a unidirectional channel.

YouTube plays a politically complementary role. YouTube has also had a considerable impact on the Spanish political landscape. Politicians and parties have used this platform to publish campaign videos, debates, and announcements. Moreover, YouTube is a key platform for political influencers and “independent” channels that interact in a less unidirectional manner with a less passive audience than on Facebook, reaching a younger and often more critical audience with the party system.

 

European elections 2024 in Spain

Results of European elections 2024 in Spain
See also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_European_Parliament_election_in_Spain

In Spain, elections to the European Parliament are held in a single constituency, meaning the entire country is considered a single electoral district. Traditionally, this system facilitates the entry of new parties and electoral actors, as they do not need to obtain a significant number of votes in each region separately or a high amount in a particular region to gain representation. Additionally, the voter turnout rate is extraordinarily lower than in general elections (in the last European elections, it was over 20% lower).

Moreover, European issues and competences are completely absent from campaigns, debates, and party speeches, which have no qualms about framing the European elections in national or even plebiscitary terms. As a result, the outcomes are hardly extrapolated to general elections and comparable only to previous European elections. Still, such comparisons are very limited in an unstable context like the Spanish political landscape of the last five years.

That said, the two major national parties on the left-right axis, PSOE and PP, emerged strengthened. The former weathered the wear and tear better than expected after five years of minority government, and the latter significantly improved its previous results, being the most voted party by four points. However, although the major left-wing party in government did not win the elections and the major right-wing party did not achieve a result that validated its plebiscite against the government, the years when both leaderships were threatened by the emergence of new parties are definitively over.

Regarding the two crutch parties, on the left, Sumar, the splinter group of Podemos, suffered a severe electoral punishment not only because of the vote split between Sumar and its former parent Podemos but also due to the division and confrontation staged during the campaign. On the right, VOX, the party to the right of the PP, also suffered, albeit to a lesser extent. Although its results are substantially better than five years ago, its growth has stalled over the last year and has been affected by a new actor, which is the most significant “shift” of the elections.

Alvise is defined by the press as an ultra agitator. His speech and proposal try to mimic those of VOX or Bukele, taking the nativist discourse of immigration criminalization to new heights. Like other candidates in the history of European elections in Spain, he did not hide that one of his objectives in running for the European elections is to obtain judicial immunity to shield himself from legal demands (in this case, for spreading falsehoods), like those he has already faced in the past. But unlike other candidates in the history of European elections in Spain who did not hide the same intentions, Alvise’s platform was not television, not even Twitter (from which he was expelled for spreading falsehoods), nor Facebook, as his electorate is younger, nor YouTube, where he shares an ecosystem with other “independent” influencers of the same ideology. It was his own Telegram channel.
 

Election integrity in Spain
In Spain, the regulation and disclosure requirements for the funding of political ads are primarily governed by the Organic Law 5/1985, of June 19, on the General Electoral Regime (Ley Orgánica del Régimen Electoral General or LOREG), and subsequent amendments. Here are the key aspects:

Funding Regulations
Sources of Funding:

Public Funding: Political parties receive public funds based on the number of votes and seats they obtain in elections.
Private Funding: Political parties can also receive private donations, but these are subject to strict limits and transparency requirements.

These limits are outlined primarily in the Organic Law 8/2007, of July 4, on the Financing of Po-litical Parties (Ley Orgánica 8/2007, de 4 de julio, sobre financiación de los partidos políticos), as well as relevant provisions in the Organic Law 5/1985, of June 19, on the General Electoral Regime (LOREG). They are:

Individual Donations: Donations from individuals to a political party are capped at €50,000 per donor per year.
Donors must be Spanish citizens or residents.

Corporate Donations: Corporations and other legal entities are prohibited from making donations to political parties. This measure aims to prevent conflicts of interest and undue influence from businesses.

Anonymous Donations: Anonymous donations are strictly prohibited.
All donations must be made through identifiable means, such as bank transfers, to ensure traceability.

Foreign Donations: Donations from foreign individuals or entities are prohibited, with the exception of contributions from Spanish citizens living abroad.
 

Transparency Requirements

Disclosure of Donors: Political parties are required to disclose the identity of any donor who contributes more than €25,000 in a single year.
The names of these donors and the amounts donated must be included in the party’s annual financial report.
Annual Financial Reports: Political parties must submit detailed annual financial reports to the Court of Auditors (Tribunal de Cuentas).
These reports must include all sources of income, including donations, as well as detailed accounts of expenditures. Xnet and other organisations have denunciate often that the figures are not detailed enough.

Public Access to Financial Information: The Court of Auditors publishes an annual report on the finances of political parties, which is accessible to the public. Xnet and other organisations have denunciate often that the figures are not detailed and clear enough.

Special Accounts for Campaigns: Political parties must maintain separate accounts for electoral campaigns.
All campaign-related income and expenses must be recorded in these accounts and included in the post-election financial report submitted to the Court of Auditors.

Spending Limits: There are caps on the amount that parties can spend on election campaigns. These limits are established based on the type of election and the number of constituencies. In 2024 European Election, with one constituency only the spending limit was set at €2,707,000 for each party.

Advertising and Media
Media Access: During electoral campaigns, political parties are granted access to public media to broadcast their messages.

The allocation of media time is proportional to the results obtained in the previous equivalent election, Xnet has denunciate often that the private television don’t respect this rule.

About the enforcement of EU legislations, Spain is late. DSA’s Coordinator of Digital Services has been attributed to Comisión Nacional del Mercado y de la Competencia (CNMC), but the organigramme is not in pace yet.

Xnet has been observing elections since 2013 and has collaborated with the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) on many occasions. To highlight, his contribution to the OSCE report on the 2015 general elections.

Some of the most recurring deficits of the Spanish electoral system that Xnet has been denouncing for years are the bias of the media, the ephemerality of the recount, voting by mail, the financing of electoral campaigns or the violation of the secret vote. The latter is also linked to an extensive investigation into the transfer of the electoral roll to political parties, an exception allowed by the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and which Xnet criticizes, as we will see later. In Spain it is tradition that the parties send the ballot home and that in many places people take the vote prepared from home and there are not even voting booths, which implies vote buying and coerced votes.

The Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) has made several observations and criticisms about the Spanish electoral system in its election observation mission reports that Xnet agrees with over the years, such as:

Proportional Representation and Electoral System: The OSCE has pointed out that the Spanish proportional representation electoral system, based on the D’Hondt system, often lead to disproportionality in representation. This is due to the use of provincial constituencies with different population sizes, with a prize for the less populated areas, which can favor larger parties and disadvantage smaller ones.

Transparency in Party Financing: Transparency and oversight in the financing of political parties is another concern. The OSCE has recommended greater transparency in financing and accountability of parties to prevent corruption and increase public trust. Xnet insists that the publication of expenses is in the law, but there is no precisions and the sanctions are to light so that it is massively not respected.

Access to Media: Unequal access to media for different political parties has been criticized. The OSCE has highlighted that larger parties have a greater presence in the media, which can affect the level playing field during electoral campaigns. Xnet point out that the private media don’t respect the principle of the law on this regard, choosing the more polarising options to increase benefits.

Electoral Administration: Electoral administration and supervision of the electoral process have also been focal points. The OSCE has noted the need for greater independence and professionalization of electoral bodies to ensure impartiality and efficiency in the electoral process. Xnet add that again during these election it has been a scandal because the data don’t correspond to the experience of the voters. The ballot are often quickly destroyed so that the recount sometimes is impossible. The election commissions are opaque.

Voters’ Rights: Apart the non-respect of the right for the secrecy of the vote mentioned before, there have also been observations regarding voters’ rights, especially concerning Spanish citizens residing abroad. The OSCE has recommended improving procedures to ensure that these citizens can effectively exercise their right to vote.

The more recent report of the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) is related to the General Elections in July 2023.

Here a summary of its recommendation:

– Ensure effectiveness and consistency in the implementation of polling procedures and prevent any interference from unauthorized persons.

– Gender-disaggregated data about the electoral administration and process should be made available in a comprehensive manner.

– The election commissions at all levels should conduct their meetings in open sessions. Decisions of election commissions should be made publicly available promptly, allowing for transparency and public scrutiny.

– Accessibility should be a goal of election management bodies throughout the entire electoral process. Among other measures, education materials, including on the rights of political participation and election procedures, should be available in easy-to-read language and other accessible formats.

– In the interests of legal certainty, safeguards of electoral integrity, including the requirements to produce identification documents when submitting a postal ballot, should be foreseen in the law.

– The election administration should take steps to reinforce the secrecy of the vote, including through voter education. The layout of the polling stations and the available equipment should also encourage secret personal voting, for example by ensuring barrier-free voting premises or accessible voting booths.

– Preliminary and final election results disaggregated by polling station should be publicly available in a timely manner.

– The authorities should further enhance efforts to dissuasively address the practice of using public office for campaign purposes. To further provide for a level playing field, political parties and candidates should comply with the law and refrain from using public office for campaign purposes.

– Ongoing efforts to counter disinformation should continue to be supported by public authorities and non-state actors, and include enhanced coordinated measures between big-tech companies, media outlets and fact-checking organizations as well as initiatives promoting inter-party dialogue.

In our experience in previous elections since 2014, where we established an incident telephone number that starts at 8:00 a.m. until 9:00 p.m. It was overwhelmed with calls, used by more than 14,000.
80% of the incidents were related to the unequal distribution of ballots at the polling stations or their absence since the ballots of the emerging parties are often not found.
During the scrutiny at the polling stations, 100% of the incidents were related to very worrying errors in the vote counting due to ignorance of the tables and confusion between parties, which is then reproduced at various points of communication, creating an effect “broken phone”.
We were able to verify the loss of about 10,000 votes every 100,000 for minority parties.

This year it seems that things continue in the same way. There was a notorious scandal regarding the distribution of the votes of a Catalan independence party that was running alone (Junts). At least 16,000 votes were recorded as having been cast outside Catalonia, which is unlikely.

About the census issue, Xnet reported that the right to data protection is a fundamental right that guarantees individuals’ control over their data, its use and its destination. It must be respected by both public and private bodies. Even so, there are exceptions provided for in the legislation that apply to certain obligations, the main consequence of which is that the public loses effective control over their data. For this to be admissible from the point of view of fundamental freedoms, there must be very good reasons for such exceptions.
The legislation provides for exceptions in the case of the data people provide in the Register of Inhabitants held by their Council, meaning all the registered population. This data is used to draw up the electoral census. There is a tradition dating back to the 19th century and permitted under Spanish law that consists of transferring this exhaustive database of the population (including the private addresses of victims, activists, journalists, lawyers, etc.) to all political parties, even the most extremist. This tradition may have made sense when there was no other way for people to read the manifestos of parties, but it endured in the age of television and now endures in the age of the Internet.

After examining the laws that regulate both the municipal census and the electoral census, the flow of data can be inferred, from the person registering in the municipal census of inhabitants up to communication of this data to political parties, is as follows:
PUBLIC → COUNCIL (register of inhabitants) → NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF STATISTICS → CITY COUNCIL + CIVIL REGISTRY (used for updating the register of inhabitants) → OFFICE OF THE ELECTORAL CENSUS (census) → POLITICAL PARTIES.
The data of each voter provided to political parties comprises: Name and surname, province and municipality of residence, district, section and polling station, address, date of birth and nationality for foreign voters. And in the case of voters living abroad, this includes whether they have requested the vote, where they are registered for electoral purposes, domicile, country of residence and date of birth.
It is clear that it is convenient to modify the General Electoral System Law to repeal this communication and prohibit this massive communication of data that has been taking place since 1985.

The law that governs the processing of personal data during the electoral period is the Organic Law on the General Electoral System, with the Organic Law on Data Protection and the Guarantee of Digital Rights and the European Data Protection Regulation applying only subsidiarily.

As such, communication of this data to the political parties under the Electoral Law is maintained, and the new European General Data Protection Regulation has not help taking into consideration the continued abusive practices by the public authorities. With the passing of the new Organic Law on Data Protection, it has only been included the option to object to the communication of data to political parties, when we consider that it should be the other way around if we want to remain true to the privacy by design and by default principle: people should be able to ask for the data to be communicated to political parties in order to receive electoral propaganda and not to oppose in order not to receive it. Moreover, the way in which this right to opposition can be exercised (an electronic certificate is necessary) may make it difficult for a large part of the public to exercise it effectively.

GDPR does not protect in this case either, leaving this circumstance in the hands of States.
Apart from this data communication taking place, it should be noted that in most cases, people are not informed when they register in the Municipal Register of Inhabitants of future communications of their personal data to other administrations or political parties, or for what purpose these bodies are going to use their data. This violates one of the essential principles of the European Data Protection Regulation, the principle of transparency, which requires the knowledge of individuals, when they provide their data, of the uses for which said data is intended and to whom they will be communicated where applicable, in addition to the obligation to offer the right to oppose to it.
Based on all these considerations, we call for a change in the law for an updated and better democracy.
 
The proposal and legislative analysis can be found here:
Report and Legislative Proposals on Institutionalised Abuses in Privacy and Data Protection
https://xnet-x.net/en/data-protection-election-propaganda-census/
https://xnet-x.net/en/data-protection-election-propaganda-census/#law
https://xnet-x.net/en/xnet-privacy-data-protection-institutionalised-abuses/

Petition sent to the Chair of the Petitions Committee European Parliament; European Commission Commissioner Mr. Didier Reynders; Directorate General of Democracy of the Council of Europe (DGII); OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR).
https://xnet-x.net/en/end-abuse-eu-citizens-personal-data-elections/

Main themes during the electoral campaign 2024 in Spain
During the period of the European elections, Spain had no general elections or any other type of elections. These elections marked the end of an intense electoral cycle that began a year earlier with the municipal and regional elections. The entire cycle was framed in plebiscitary terms about the current coalition government, its president, and its agreements with Catalan independence forces. This approach, which had such good results for the PP in the regional and municipal elections a year ago, is beginning to show evident signs of exhaustion.

In general, the themes observed in campaign advertisements coincided with concerns expressed by citizens on the streets, whether these concerns were natural or induced by the major media. However, on the streets, there is also a strong desire for change and renewal in the form of disaffection with the parties, even the new parties that took advantage of the 15M have aged quickly by showing that they did not intend to fulfill their promises, especially among young voters and those dissatisfied with the current state of politics.

Vox and other right-wing parties, such as the movement led by Alvise, highlighted the migration issue and security issues, using harsh rhetoric to attract voters concerned about these topics.

 

The data we analysed

The WTM extension was operated by various members of the Xnet team from March 2024 onwards. The data from advertising declared as funded by political parties was distributed according to the political party, whether at the state or regional level, or in the case of municipal parties or parties with little or no representation, in the category labelled ‘Other parties’. In addition, political ads have also been classified according to the alliances created for the European elections. In contrast, political advertising not reported as party-funded has been classified into two groups: ‘Left Wing Prescribers’ and ‘Right Wing Prescribers’(9). The latter category also encompasses media and influencers with a pronounced political orientation. Finally, NGOs with an international presence have been classified in a group designated ‘Large NGOs’ and have been excluded since their Ads are continuous all year long, mostly for financing themselves.

The WTM extension currently monitors 2,873 profiles that have been categorised as political advertising out of a total of 45,443 paid advertisements on the Facebook platform in Spain.

We consider that there is two distinct time periods that are interesting, a longer and a shorter one. The first period will encompass the dates between 16 May, which marks the beginning of observed advertising expenditure by political parties in the lead-up to the European elections – since in the previous period other elections where happening in Spain -, and 9 June, the date of the elections themselves. The second period covers the week of the European elections.

Political party and other relevant actors spending between May 16 and June 9.

Political party and other relevant actors spending between June 3 and 9.

The sum of the expenditure of all groups as of May 16 is €778,127.

The sum of the spending of all groups in the last week is €375,625.

Therefore, spending in the last week is equivalent to approximately half of spending a month before the elections.

Focusing only on the parties, the one that spends the most money is the PSOE, currently in government. Secondly, we find Podemos. However, their strategies are very different. The PSOE has 55 active pages with an average expenditure of €4,261, while PODEMOS has only 2 active pages with an average expenditure of €23,832. In third place we find the Popular Party, with a strategy similar to that of the PSOE.

But the interesting aspect is that the real first place is for the left-wing prescribers, spending more than twice as much as the PSOE, the political party that spends the most.

To compare the results with those of the last general elections, we take the period between June 16 and July 23 2023, the latter being the date of the elections. We find that the total expenditure, excluding large NGOs, is €1,070,486, an expenditure significantly higher than that of European elections, as expected. In this case, the first place in terms of spending is the PSOE (€342,262), followed by the PP (€258,877) and other left-wing leaders (€245,828). Once again, we find the left-wing prescribers in the top 3 during the elections.

From the data collected, it is derived that the left, is supported in Facebook by other organisation that invert more than the political parties themselves during electoral campaign. We know, but we cannot bring our own data on that, that the right, in particular the far-right, has used this methodology more in Twitter (X), Youtube and Telegram.

In Facebook, accounts such as ‘Hope’ or ‘Spanish Revolution’, increase their advertising activity on social networks during electoral periods, some indicating which parties to vote for. These practices are a clear example of ‘astroturfing’(10), in which the aim is to give a grassroots movement approach to a campaign related to political parties.

Analysis based on the sample provided by users who installed the #whotargetsme (#dequiensoyblanco9j) extension in Spain

(Data Analysis by Irene Ball)
Here the Raw Data

The “Who Targets Me” extension is a browser extension that allows the collection, cataloguing, and visualization of electoral advertising that the persons that has it installed is exposed to while using Facebook. The extension cross-references data with those on campaigns and funded posts that Very Large Online Platforms (VLOPs) are required to make public.

The objective of the research is to determine whether there is profiling based on ideological tendencies between the products Facebook sells and the parties purchase, which would be illegal under the new European legislation, particularly the Digital Service Act (DSA).

Number of people who have downloaded the extension and seen any type of advertising: 89
Total number of men: 65
Total number of women: 24

Demographic Distribution of the Sample:

In addition to the gender imbalance in the sample, it is noteworthy that there is no data available for centre-right or right-wing groups (only for the far-right), which creates a gap in the results due to the lack of information regarding these two groups.
 

The advertising that we will consider below falls into the following categories:

– Parties appearing in the figures
Sumar (Sum), Vox (VOX), Partido Socialista Obrero Español (PSOE), Podemos (POD), Coalición por una Europa Solidaria [Partido Nacionalista Vasco, Coalición Canaria, Atarrabia Taldea Na-varra, Geroa Socialverdes Navarra, El Pi – Proposta per les Illes Balears] (CEUS: our sample only includes data for Partido Nacionalista Vasco), Partido Popular (PP), Ciudadanos (CS), Ahora Repúblicas [Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya, Euskal Herria Bildu País Vasco-Navarra, Blo-que Nacionalista Galego, Andecha Astur, Puyalón Aragón, Unidad del Pueblo Canarias, Alter-nativa Nacionalista Canaria] (Arep: our sample only includes data for Esquerra Republicana Ca-talunya), Others (Otros).

– Parties not appearing in the charts because our sample has no data about them
Aliança Catalana (AC), Bloque Nacionalista Galego (BNG), Candidatura d’Unitat Popular (CUP), Ara més (Més), Coalición Canaria (CCa), EH Bildu (EHB), FORO Asturias (FORO), Junts (Jun), NC-BC (NC-BC), PDeCAT (PDeCAT), Unión del Pueblo Navarro (UPN).

– Influencers
Left Wing (LW), Right Wing (RW).

– Large NGOs (which we will exclude after the next figure because they are completely uniform and their spending nearly doubles that of the other categories).

SOCIAL ADVERTISING TARGET ANALYSIS

These are individuals who have received at least one advertisement from Spanish state parties, NGOs, left-wing influencers, and/or right-wing influencers. In other words, the remaining sample after removing users who saw ads classified as ‘not of interest’ and those who only saw electoral advertising from European (non-Spanish) political parties.

Number of social advertising recipients from a sample of 89: 43
Total number of men: 35
Total number of women: 8

Entities after filtering: [‘ONG’, ‘Sum’, ‘LW’, ‘RW’, ‘VOX’, ‘PSOE’, ‘POD’, ‘CEUS/EAJ-PNV’, ‘Otros’, ‘PP’, ‘CS’, ‘Arep/ERC’]

Demographic Distribution of the Sample:

SOCIAL ADVERTISING TARGET ANALYSIS

We define sociopolitical advertising recipients as those who have received advertising from Spanish state political parties, left-wing influencers, and/or right-wing influencers. That is, the previous sample after removing data from users who only received ads from large NGOs. We kept the influencers because, even though they are not parties, they do partisan advertising.

Number of sociopolitical advertising recipients from a sample of 89: 25
Total number of men: 22
Total number of women: 3

Entities after filtering:
[‘Sum’ ‘LW’ ‘RW’ ‘VOX’ ‘PSOE’ ‘POD’ ‘CEUS/EAJ-PNV’ ‘Otros’ ‘PP’ ‘CS’ ‘Arep/ERC’]

Demographic Distribution of the Sample:

Due to the sample size, users will be grouped together regardless of their gender from now on.

Proportion of Political Advertising Received by Units, Regardless of Gender:

The charts above do not show absolute numbers, i.e., how many ads from a certain political party were seen in each ideological range. This is because there are different amounts of units/people in each ideological range. Instead, a proportion was made between the size of the sample (how many people in each ideological range) and the number of ads received in each range. The goal is to see if a range received more items from a political party regardless of whether there were more people in this range in our sampling.

As the sample is very small, we believe that to determine if there are ideological biases, we need to ensure that there are no other biases, such as territorial bias. Therefore, we conducted a more extensive demographic exploration by age group, autonomous community, and ideological affinity to see if the perceived bias could be influenced by legal territorial segmentation rather than ideological segmentation. In some cases, such as recipients of information from parties with regional priorities, this is the case.

Using a colours map, we can visualise how many users we have in each category.
 

Number of Sociopolitical Advertising Recipients by Age, Administrative Regions, and Ideological Affinity

Note the Basque Country:

Male between 45-54 years old from centre-left.
Female between 55-64 years old from the left.

This chart allows us to verify that only one centre-left user has viewed electoral advertising from EAJ-PNV, a party with a main presence in the Basque Country, coinciding with the male user residing in the Basque Country. We have an initial indication of a territorial (legal) bias. However, it is impossible with the current sample size to determine if there was also bias for ideological reasons (centre users), as the filtering category could have simply been ‘Men’ or ‘Men of X age range,’ which is completely legal currently. In other words, it is impossible to determine whether the left-leaning female resident in the Basque Country did not see EAJ-PNV advertising because she is ideologically farther to the left or for other demographic reasons such as being female, age, or other factors.

On the other hand, we find it interesting to highlight as a possible indication of ideological bias in Facebook advertising that no data from the Catalan centre-right political party Junts appeared in our sample despite them having run electoral ads and our sample including 5 Catalan people (20% of the sample): one aged 35-44 very left-wing; one aged 45-54 very left-wing; one aged 45-54 centre-left; one aged 55-64 very right-wing; one aged 65+ very left-wing. Could it be that Junts only targeted ads to centre and centre-right individuals? An equivalent segmentation to what Facebook allows advertisers and/or a much larger sample would be needed to find out.
 

Case Study: Madrid

To avoid other biases that the WTM tool does not give information about and that could be relevant in such a small sample, we select the sample that most likely groups the targets that parties and influencers would choose: the city of Madrid, being the capital and the city with the highest concentration of people. Additionally, for the Autonomous Community ‘Madrid,’ we only have data on men, which eliminates one more variability factor.

Proportion of Political Advertising Received by Units (Men, Madrid)

As indicated throughout the report, despite the impossibility of drawing significant conclusions due to the sample size, we can affirm that there are high possibilities of ideological bias, as for example, the only users who see ads from all political parties are from the centre. However, these observations only establish a starting point for a hypothesis. Higher quality data would be needed to conclude that there is bias due to illegal profiling.

Currently, the level of segmentation that Meta allows when choosing an audience makes it very difficult to determine if there is ideological bias, requiring very large samples and/or covering all the variables that Facebook allows advertisers.

One possible litigation is that the categories Meta stores actually allow the reconstruction of hypersensitive data and are invasive.

 

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(1)
See Levi, Simona et al. #FakeYou https://www.rayoverde.es/catalogo/fakeyou/ (2019);
https://xnet-x.net/en/fakeyou-disinformation-free-download/ (2024).

(2)
Davies, N. 2008. Flat Earth News: An Awardwinning Reporter Exposes Falsehood, Distortion and Propaganda in the Global Media. London, United Kingdom: Random House UK. ISBN 0701181451 (ISBN13: 9780701181451).

(3)
https://euobserver.com/opinion/157187

(4)
Lutz, A. 2012. These 6 Corporations Control 90% of the Media in America. Business insider. (24 June 2012.)
Retrieved from < https://www.businessinsider.com/these-6-corporations-control-90-of-the-media-in-america-2012-6>.

(5)
Confessore, N. 2018. Cambridge Analytica and Facebook: The Scandal and the Fallout So Far. The New York Times. (4 April 2018.)
Retrieved from <https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/04/us/politics/cambridge-analytica-scandal-fallout.html>.

(6)
Hern, A. 2017. How social media filter bubbles and algorithms influence the election. The Guardian. (22 May 2017.)
Retrieved from <https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/may/22/social-media-election-facebook-filter-bubbles>.

(7)
Newcombe, J. 2018. Fake News: Propaganda in the 21st Century. Medium. (24 June 2018.)
Retrieved from <https://medium.com/@jeremynewcombe_5950/fake-news-propaganda-in-the-21st-century-da13fdcd7ff5>.

(8)
For instance: Society of Professional Journalists. 2014. Code of Ethics.
Retrieved from <https://www.spj.org/ethicscode.asp>.

(9)
See also Levi, Simona et al. (2019-2024) Fake You – An Activist’s Guide to Defeating Disinformation – Don’t blame the people; don’t blame the Internet; blame the power – Governments, political parties, mass media, large corporations and fortunes: the monopolies of information manipulation and the threats to freedom of expression.

(10)
See also Levi, Simona et al. (2019-2024) Fake You – An Activist’s Guide to Defeating Disinformation – Governments, political parties, mass media, large corporations and fortunes: the monopolies of information manipulation and the threats to freedom of expression.