AI chatbots are proving to be “inaccurate and evidently prejudiced” when providing election recommendations, the Netherlands’ data watchdog has stated, raising alarms about a potential threat to democratic processes just over a week before national elections.
Testing Reveals Repeated Partiality in Chatbot Recommendations
The four chatbots evaluated by the AP “often end up with the same two parties”, irrespective of the user’s question or command, the regulator noted in a report released ahead of the late October vote.
In more than half of the cases, the chatbot suggested either the far-right Freedom party (PVV) of the politician Geert Wilders or the leftwing GroenLinks-PvdA led by the former European Commission vice-president Frans Timmermans.
Some parties, such as the centre-right CDA, “are rarely ever cited”, despite the fact that the user’s input precisely aligns with the positions of these parties, the report pointed out.
Official Warns Against Relying on AI Assistants for Voting Guidance
The deputy head of the AP, the official Monique Verdier, commented that while chatbots may seem like clever tools, “as a voting aid, they consistently fail”. Voters were being pushed toward a party that might not correspond to their political views, she emphasized.
“This directly impacts a cornerstone of democracy: the integrity of free and fair elections,” Verdier stated. “We thus caution against employing AI assistants for election recommendations, as their functioning is opaque and difficult to verify.”
Election Context and Political Landscape
The Dutch head to the polls on 29 October in an election that will be keenly observed across the continent for the performance of the Freedom party.
The right-leaning group of Geert Wilders is leading the polls but the gap to the left-wing and centre-right parties appears to be narrowing, with numerous electors yet to make up their minds.
All major parties have ruled out an alliance with the PVV, meaning the runner-up party is most likely to supply the future head of government.
Unintentional Bias Attributed to AI Operation
The AP stressed that the AI systems were not intentionally prejudiced, and that their “identified shortcomings” are a result of the manner in which AI assistants function.
