Fears that abuse of artificial intelligence (AI) could cause political instability and lead to a rise in communal violence are rising ahead of upcoming national polls.
According to the Election Commission (EC), the 13th parliamentary elections will be held in the first half of February next year.
After the timeline for the election was finally stamped, Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) AMM Nasir Uddin on 6 August expressed concern about the role played by AI in spreading disinformation.
The following day, Election Commissioner Abul Fazal Md Sanaullah said they had formed a committee to tackle the spread of disinformation, although he did not divulge any details.
He said that they are concerned about three things – misinformation, disinformation and malinformation.
Disinformation is a false or misleading piece of information spread with the intention to deceive or cause harm. When disinformation is shared without the intent to manipulate people, it is called misinformation. Malinformation means the deliberate publication of private information for personal, corporate or political interests rather than public benefit.
Experts said the disinformation or malinformation is largely spread to further political, financial or personal interests.
For now, experts warn that committees, rules, and debunking rumours after the fact will do little to curb the rapid spread of AI-driven falsehoods. The best immediate defence, they say, is to keep the public alert, informed, and resilient against manipulation – before the lies go viral.
When falsehoods turn violent
Bangladesh has already experienced the destructive power of disinformation. In September 2012, mobs attacked the Buddhist community in Ramu, Cox's Bazar after a Facebook post was manipulated, falsely claiming that a local man had demeaned Islam.
Similar campaigns fuelled violence against Hindus in Nasirnagar in 2016, Rangpur in 2017, and nationwide in October 2021 during the Durga Puja festival, when a viral video triggered attacks.
The reason may not always be political. However, in every case, a planned campaign of disinformation poured fuel on the fire.
A more dangerous election cycle
Fact-checkers say the risk will be much greater this time.
"In 2024, disinformation was low because the election was uncontested," said Prof Sumon Rahman, founder editor of FactWatch, the country's first IFCN-certified fact-checking organisation.
"As the upcoming polls will be participatory, we expect massive disinformation fuelled by heavy political financing."
A Dismislab study found that AI-generated political videos are already circulating widely.
Reviewing 70 such videos published between June 18 and 28, the group estimated they had reached over 23 million people and generated a million interactions.
On average, each video received 328,000 views and 17,000 reactions.
The report also states that while Jamaat-e-Islami appears to have started the trend, National Citizen Party- (NCP) and BNP-aligned pages have since adopted that model.
Besides, different Awami League-affiliated groups as well as groups from neighboring countries like India are spreading disinformation in Bangladesh, Touhidul Islam Raso, a research officer at Dismislab, said.
"Disinformation thrives in environments of fear, anger, and distrust," Touhidul said, adding, "Bangladesh currently has all these elements."
Ziaul Ahmed, a political and security analyst, said the current trend, which took hold after August 5 last year, has seen disinformation play a strong role in establishing false political narratives.
It is almost certain that as the election draws nearer, the spread of disinformation will increase, resulting in instability. This could even cause communal violence during polls, he suspects.
A weak shield
Touhidul said after the late 2024 release of Google's Veo, which generates realistic videos from text and image prompts, it has become easier to create deepfakes. This has also made it exceedingly difficult and far more time consuming for fact checkers to debunk the video.
"For the EC, it will be more difficult. They don't even have proper guidelines for online campaigning during the silence period," he added.
In Bangladesh, all campaigning is generally stopped 48 hours before the polling day, which is known as the "pre-election period" or silence period. For instance, ahead of the 12th parliamentary elections on January 7, 2024, campaigning was stopped nationwide from 8:00am on 5 January.
Previously, the code of conduct, as per the National Assembly Election Code of Conduct, did not place any explicit prohibition on campaigning online or through social media.
However, the recently passed code of conduct for the 2025 elections has added rules and conditions for digital or social media campaigning for the first time.
Before starting a campaign, the candidate or the person in charge must submit their name, account ID or e-mail ID to the EC's Returning Officer. All types of online or social media campaigning must be stopped 48 hours before the polling day.
However, Sumon Rahman, a professor at the University of Liberal Arts Bangladesh and a fact-checker, said many others actively campaign for or against a candidate alongside those in charge.
" They will be hard to tackle," he said.
He added that debunking disinformation is getting more difficult as time goes by.
"In the last six months, it has become more difficult to identify fake videos without any fact checking tools," he said.
"Forming a committee to tackle disinformation during polls sends a good message to the people and political parties. But the truth is it also involves huge bureaucratic activities as well. It will consume a lot of time. Again, if the committee or government tries to fact-check a post, it will take at least three to four days to debunk. And this period is enough to sow chaos across the country," he explained.
"Given the current situation, it can be said the EC will be unable to curb disinformation during polls. If they follow the preferred manual process, they can debunk maybe 20% to 30% of all such posts at best," he said.
Both experts agree that having local representatives of social media companies in Bangladesh, combined with public awareness campaigns in rural areas, would be more effective.
"Fact-checking remains city-centric — rural literacy on this issue could slow the spread," Touhid said.
Political parties cry foul
Dhaka Stream discussed the issue with several political parties.
BNP Senior Joint Secretary General Ruhul Kabir Rizvi believes their political party is the largest victim of disinformation.
"Before the July Uprising, the BNP was one of the victims of disinformation. But after August 5, BNP came to the forefront of such campaigns. We have witnessed it in Puran Dhaka and Comilla incidents as well," he said, referring to violent incidents when the BNP was falsely accused.
NCP's Joint Chief Coordinator Arifur Rahman Tuhin feels that despite being a newly formed political party, they are also facing hardship due to disinformation. Even female members of the party are being bullied, he said.
Ehsanul Mahbub Jubayer, a spokesperson for Jamaat, expressed the same.
When asked what they were doing to combat disinformation, he said it is the government's duty to ensure a level playing field.
He added that tackling disinformation is not an easy task, but Jamaat is doing its best to keep their members and leaders away from such controversy and ensure they follow party command.
Prof Sumon added that internal efforts to keep members of political parties from engaging in disinformation campaigns is the "best approach", but one that is rarely implemented consistently.
"We can merely see a continuation of their words. If they can ensure it, disinformation could have lesser impact during the election," he added.
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