AI chatbots are proving to be “unreliable and clearly biased” when providing election recommendations, the Dutch data protection authority (AP) has stated, raising alarms about a possible risk to democratic processes just over a week before the country’s general election.
Testing Reveals Repeated Partiality in Chatbot Recommendations
The four chatbots evaluated by the AP “often end up with the same two parties”, regardless of the voter’s inquiry or input, the watchdog noted in a analysis released ahead of the 29 October election.
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 ex-EU commissioner Frans Timmermans.
Certain groups, such as the centre-right CDA, “are rarely ever cited”, despite the fact that the voter’s query exactly matches the positions of these parties, the report indicated.
Authority Figure Cautions Against Relying on AI Assistants for Election Advice
The deputy head of the AP, 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 did not necessarily align with their ideological beliefs, she emphasized.
“This directly impacts a cornerstone of democracy: the integrity of free and fair elections,” said Verdier. “We thus caution against using AI chatbots for voting advice, as their operation is unclear and hard to confirm.”
Voting Background and Party Dynamics
Netherlands citizens vote on 29 October in an electoral contest that will be closely watched around Europe for the showing of the PVV.
The right-leaning group of Wilders is leading the polls but the lead over the left-wing and centre-right parties seems to be closing, with numerous electors still undecided.
All major parties have rejected a coalition with the PVV, implying the runner-up party is most likely to supply the future head of government.
Inadvertent Prejudice Linked to Chatbot Functioning
The authority stressed that the bots were not deliberately biased, and that their “noted flaws” are a result of the way AI chatbots operate.
