Google’s Search Engine Could Determine Outcome of Election

So Google executives will intentionally utilize the ranking algorithm to manipulate the election?  Not necessarily, as it can happen by ‘organic processes”, says Epstein, an author of this study.

“Call it…..googlemandering,” why don’t we?—is happening without any human intervention at all. “These numbers are so large that Google executives are irrelevant to the issue…..“If Google’s search algorithm, just through what they call ‘organic processes,’ ends up favoring one candidate over another, that’s enough.”

Robert Epstein, a psychologist at the American Institute for Behavioral Research and Technology, based his research on years of experiment in voter search engine research.   His team coined the phrase “vote manipulation power,” of VMP, where those who saw the positive results for a candidate were more likely to vote for him or her, by “more than 48 percent”.

In a swing state, this information is invaluable, as a tiny percentage can alter the outcome of an election.  Search engine optimization would be an expensive way to utilize this, but getting the media to present a favorable account would be a good strategy.  The voter would be most likely to believe a media sourced story over a candidate’s campaign advertisement.

“I think that generally people don’t trust campaigns because they tend to have a low opinion of politicians,” Shor says.  “They are more receptive to information from institutions for which they have more respect.”

If the vote is tight, and many are, then this Googlemandering can play an enormous role.

“At the end of the day, the fact is that in a lot of races it only takes a swing of 3 or 4 percent. If the search engine is one or two percent, that’s still really persuasive.”

Read more at WIRED

Photo: © Dudau | Dreamstime.com – Google Search Photo