Anne-Sophie Dhiver is the deputy head of the French government agency Viginum, the first and only investigative body created by a Western democracy entirely focused on tackling the risks posed by online information operations. Public awareness of those risks is now almost a decade old, with the threat having first come under the spotlight following the 2016 presidential election in the United States. That focus itself has been criticized with experts warning it can amplify rather than suppress the impact of hostile activities. Dhiver, as a former employee of Google and a veteran of Google France’s Elections Task Force, as well as a graduate of the French War College, said Viginum was very aware of the risk of unintentional amplification. She spoke to Recorded Future News in Paris late last month — shortly after the inauguration of Donald Trump and ahead of the German federal elections — about why and how her agency was addressing the threat. The winner of those German elections, Friedrich Merz, said during the campaign that President Trump’s close associate Elon Musk would face consequences for intervening in support of the far-right AfD. Dhiver explained how Viginum does not pay attention to Musk’s words, but is assisting French regulators investigating the social media platform X over potentially manipulated algorithms.
Focus on Elon Musk’s algorithms, not his words, says France’s disinformation agency (Alexander Martin, The Record)
Related articles
