Amid specious stories and rumors regarding the possibility that Tuvalu might switch diplomatic recognition from Taiwan to China, reports have emerged that a Chinese state-run broadcaster has asked a news outlet in the Pacific nation to post articles promoting the idea that Funafuti would cut ties with Taipei after its legislative elections last week.
In an e-mail allegedly from China Global Television Network, the sender offered to pay someone at Tuvalu Broadcasting Corp to find a “senior person” at the broadcaster to write an 800-word opinion article “on Tuvalu election and it’s [sic] potential to cut ties with Taiwan.” The e-mail offers to pay the recipient US$450 “tax free,” which they could share with the writer.
The e-mail confirms Taiwanese diplomats’ suspicions that China is paying media to spread misinformation to induce a diplomatic shift away from Taiwan, and to sow distrust in the government and its allies.
Photo: grab from DPP Legislator Wang Ding-yu FB
China has long deployed cognitive warfare tactics aiming to undermine Taiwan’s democracy and sovereignty. However, those efforts have escalated with artificial intelligence technology, and extended beyond domestic issues and cross-strait relations to foreign affairs, to incite skepticism about Washington’s commitment to Taipei and generate tension between Taiwan and its allies to further isolate it from the international community.
The Ministry of Justice Investigation Bureau has said that during the lead-up to the Jan. 13 presidential and legislative elections, the quality and quantity of foreign hostile forces’ information warfare significantly improved, with social media accounts that are much harder to track and “deepfake” videos that are more difficult to spot.
Although Taiwan mostly shrugged off China’s electoral meddling, Larry Diamond, a senior fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution, said afterward that information manipulation would only worsen, and it is not only a problem for Taiwan, but the whole world. He said his research indicates that social media is one of the crucial factors leading to a global democratic recession.
The Investigation Bureau this month inaugurated its Cognitive Warfare Research Center dedicated to studying disinformation threats to Taiwan’s democracy and security. In addition to research, Taiwan needs more ways to prevent, confront and eliminate computer-based cognitive warfare attempts. The government should work more with fact-checking groups to promptly clarify rumors and promote public awareness to repel disinformation. More legislative support and funding are also needed.
A lot of election-related disinformation has been traced to Chinese-based content farms and social media platforms, such Douyin and its international version, TikTok. In addition to communicating with major platforms to remove disinformation, the government should pass legislation on the usage of Chinese apps and social media.
Many democratic countries are considering bans on TikTok. Besides a ban on government use of TikTok and similar platforms, the government could limit usage of them by young people, or within private sectors that are susceptible to information leaking or have higher requirements for information security. However, such restrictions would require convincing the public that their freedom of speech would be protected.
Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) said that Taiwan is documenting its efforts to counter China’s unprecedented interference in the elections, and would publish the findings to help the international community combat disinformation campaigns.
Taiwan also needs to ramp up international collaborations to share know-how and form alliances to combat information manipulation, turning the nation’s experience into a positive contribution to help the world fight against authoritarian powers bent on eroding democratic systems.
Concerns that the US might abandon Taiwan are often overstated. While US President Donald Trump’s handling of Ukraine raised unease in Taiwan, it is crucial to recognize that Taiwan is not Ukraine. Under Trump, the US views Ukraine largely as a European problem, whereas the Indo-Pacific region remains its primary geopolitical focus. Taipei holds immense strategic value for Washington and is unlikely to be treated as a bargaining chip in US-China relations. Trump’s vision of “making America great again” would be directly undermined by any move to abandon Taiwan. Despite the rhetoric of “America First,” the Trump administration understands the necessity of
In an article published on this page on Tuesday, Kaohsiung-based journalist Julien Oeuillet wrote that “legions of people worldwide would care if a disaster occurred in South Korea or Japan, but the same people would not bat an eyelid if Taiwan disappeared.” That is quite a statement. We are constantly reading about the importance of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC), hailed in Taiwan as the nation’s “silicon shield” protecting it from hostile foreign forces such as the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), and so crucial to the global supply chain for semiconductors that its loss would cost the global economy US$1
US President Donald Trump’s challenge to domestic American economic-political priorities, and abroad to the global balance of power, are not a threat to the security of Taiwan. Trump’s success can go far to contain the real threat — the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) surge to hegemony — while offering expanded defensive opportunities for Taiwan. In a stunning affirmation of the CCP policy of “forceful reunification,” an obscene euphemism for the invasion of Taiwan and the destruction of its democracy, on March 13, 2024, the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) used Chinese social media platforms to show the first-time linkage of three new
Sasha B. Chhabra’s column (“Michelle Yeoh should no longer be welcome,” March 26, page 8) lamented an Instagram post by renowned actress Michelle Yeoh (楊紫瓊) about her recent visit to “Taipei, China.” It is Chhabra’s opinion that, in response to parroting Beijing’s propaganda about the status of Taiwan, Yeoh should be banned from entering this nation and her films cut off from funding by government-backed agencies, as well as disqualified from competing in the Golden Horse Awards. She and other celebrities, he wrote, must be made to understand “that there are consequences for their actions if they become political pawns of