Recommendation algorithms operated by social media giants TikTok and X have shown evidence of substantial far-right political bias in Germany ahead of a federal election that takes place Sunday, according to new research carried out by Global Witness.

The non-government organization (NGO) undertook an analysis of social media content displayed to new users via algorithmically sorted “For You” feeds — finding both platforms skewed heavily toward amplifying content that favors the far-right AfD party in algorithmically programmed feeds.

Global Witness’ tests identified the most extreme bias on TikTok, where 78% of the political content that was algorithmically recommended to its test accounts, and came from accounts the test users did not follow, was supportive of the AfD party. (It notes this figure far exceeds the level of support the party is achieving in current polling, where it attracts backing from around 20% of German voters.)

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    • @[email protected]
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      92 days ago

      And anything relating to gaza the comments are truly disgusting and disconnected from reality. Honestly all Reddit has become a battle ground of 80% hate and 10% people trying their best to fight back with another 10 not caring (in terms of commenters)

      • @DrDickHandler
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        52 days ago

        You forgot bots. Good % of every comments are bots on LLM algos.

        • @[email protected]
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          1 day ago

          gaza/israel related ones are from israeli bots, while everything else almost always come from russia. other users and me pointed out in the past reddit does very little to stem the amount of bots coming from RU.

        • @[email protected]
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          12 days ago

          Good point, I do forget about the bots. Sometimes I hope it’s mostly all bots, but not so sure.

      • @[email protected]
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        22 days ago

        its also the place where people get banned very easily, so i had to avoid those subs to avoid getting banned myself.

          • @[email protected]
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            11 day ago

            i avoid the sub if i get prior banned, either temporarily or a perma one if already have another account. whats different is they decided to after all the accs this time, i know they can connect through your IP or device, but they dint do it before.