Representation of the People Bill: Report Stage briefing on election information amendments

Mis- and dis-information is seen as one of the biggest problems facing elections

Our latest 2026 voter attitudes tracking research found that the impact of misinformation and disinformation is now seen as one of the biggest problems facing elections:

• 72% say it is a problem in 2026, up from 69% in 2025
• concern about media bias has also risen over time, from 62% in 2019 to 72% in 2026

These findings highlight the difficulty people face in accessing political information they trust. Confidence in the information available about politics continues to decline:  

• in 2026, 52% disagree that political information is trustworthy  
• in 2025, 46% disagreed that political information is trustworthy  

Exposure to deepfakes is increasing. Two years ago, around 43% of people reported seeing a deepfake video. This has risen to 53% in 2026.  

A clear majority (63%) believe not enough is being done to tackle election misinformation. Our previous voter attitudes research has found that the public think that Ofcom – as the UK’s regulator for the communications services that we use and rely on each day – should have primary responsibility for tackling mis- and dis-information.  

The public also think that the UK’s governments and the Electoral Commission should play a role. We will continue to support Ofcom to ensure it can deliver its important regulatory duties as they relate to elections, by sharing our expertise in electoral law and practice, including in relation to political finance regulation and the administration of elections. Our experience in regulating and advising in these areas will complement those of Ofcom in its responsibility for regulating communications and the information environment.

Many people said they saw or heard misinformation at the 2024 general election

Our research and report on the 2024 general election found that many people said they saw or heard misinformation during the election:  

• over half of people said they saw misleading or inaccurate information about political parties’ policies (61%) and candidates (52%) at the general election
• fewer than one third (30%) saw misleading or inaccurate information about how the elections work
• around a quarter (24%) saw or heard a deepfake photo, video or audio clip about the election
• just over one in 10 (12% to 13%) people said they did not know whether they saw inaccurate or misleading information about policies, candidates or the elections
• almost one-fifth (18%) said they did not know if they had seen or heard a deepfake, suggesting there is perhaps confusion among the public about being able to identify this type of content

The most common response to seeing or hearing misleading content during the 2024 general election was to ignore it (64%). Around half (49%) of respondents said they took specific action, such as fact-checking or reporting this information in some way. Of these, only one in 10 (12%) said they reported it to the platform they saw it on.

Younger people were somewhat more likely to say they took action (57% of those aged 18 to 34, compared with 46% of those aged 55 to 64 and 48% of those aged 65 to 74). 

Improving systems to protect election information and ensure voters have access to accurate and trustworthy information requires collaborative work across a range of organisations and agencies. We are a member of the UK Government’s Defending Democracy Taskforce and Joint Election Security Preparedness Unit. We also coordinate work with other regulators ahead of elections, including the Information Commissioner’s Office, the Charity Commission, the Office for Statistics Regulation and the Advertising Standards Authority.

Ofcom plays a particularly important role in protecting online election information. As the UK's regulator for the communications services, the primary responsibility for regulating providers of online services rests with Ofcom. It has significant expertise and a range of regulatory tools to ensure compliance with the Online Safety Act, and can take enforcement action against providers where appropriate.  

We recognise the risks that these amendments are intended to address. We will continue to work with Ofcom and the governments across to UK to ensure that future measures put in place to mitigate these risks are the responsibility of the appropriate organisation, which has the skills, expertise and experience to deploy them.

Deepfake detection pilot

False or misleading information can spread rapidly during elections, and AI tools have made convincing deepfakes faster and cheaper to produce. Earlier this year we began an innovative pilot to detect political deepfakes in the run up to elections and counter the growing threat to the integrity of elections of AI misinformation. The pilot ran during the May 2026 elections in England, Scotland and Wales, and also continued for the three Parliamentary by elections in June.

The system monitored online content for deepfake audio and video intended to mislead voters about the electoral process or falsely depict candidates. For example, false videos claiming a candidate has withdrawn, or audio clips falsely depicting a candidate making offensive remarks.

We will monitor and collate the evidence from this pilot. Where we identified content that raised serious concerns, we were able to refer material to the police and other relevant bodies and request that social media platforms take down content.

Campaigning principles 

Campaigners have a key role to protect election information and ensure voters have access to accurate and trustworthy information. Ahead of the May 2026 elections we published a set of principles to guide campaigning at the May elections, with a focus on maintaining respect, safety and honesty during robust debate. The voluntary principles were developed in response to recommendations made by the Speaker’s Conference on the security of MPs, candidates and elections, and build on common themes across parties’ existing codes of conduct.  

The principles make clear that deliberate misinformation and disinformation are unacceptable in election campaigns. This includes the use of technology to misrepresent the views or actions of others through AI generated disinformation. They also set out that parties and candidates should not use or amplify information, which is false or could mislead voters, including deepfake material.  

The principles are advisory and set out good practice. We will now assess and evaluate how the principles worked in practice. Using these findings, we will develop a detailed approach to expanding the principles into a non-statutory code of conduct for future elections.

Improving voter understanding about campaigning at elections

Since the 2024 UK general election, we have worked with other organisations, including regulators and social media companies, to help people understand how candidates, political parties and other organisations campaign for their vote.  

We publish information and advice for voters on how to engage confidently with campaign material and to think critically about material they saw and heard.

We continue to call on all campaigners not to mislead voters and to consider how their campaign material would be received, particularly when using generative AI.

Imprint requirements for election campaign material

The 2024 local elections and UK general election were the first large-scale electoral events, outside of Scotland, where imprints were required on some forms of digital campaign material. We first called for this change in 2003. Imprints state who is responsible for publishing campaign material, providing transparency for voters about who is campaigning to influence their vote.

We provide statutory guidance explaining how the digital imprints regime operates to support understanding and compliance by parties, candidates and campaigners. We do not see evidence of significant levels of non-compliance with these requirements. Where we identify a breach, most campaigners respond to our advice and amend their imprints.

Most candidates who responded to our survey after the 2024 UK general election broadly agreed that they understood the requirements to include digital imprints (86%), and over two-thirds (69%) said it was easy to meet the requirement.

Social media and digital platforms have become key tools for campaigners to engage with voters, but we recognise growing evidence showing that candidates and voters are increasingly exposed to inaccurate or misleading information, as well as experiencing abuse and intimidation, when using these platforms.  

The Online Safety Act has provided the regulatory framework for protecting users of online services across the UK since 2023. Ofcom is continuing to develop its approach to regulating these services and ensuring compliance with the Act’s requirements, including existing duties to protect users from foreign interference in the UK’s democratic processes.  

It will be particularly important to ensure that effective regulation in this area is able to take account of fast-paced changes in the use of online tools by campaigners and other actors to communicate with voters in the UK. We will continue to work closely with the Government and Ofcom to ensure that serious risks to the election information environment are appropriately recognised in the UK’s regulatory framework for online services, with effective compliance and enforcement mechanisms to ensure action is taken to address those risks.

We maintain ongoing dialogue with social media companies about inaccurate or misleading information about electoral processes on their platforms. We have agreements in place where we can flag instances of election-related mis- and disinformation about the electoral process to them. While these are removed in most cases when identified, more could be done to proactively counter this problem.

We have recommended that social media companies that run election advertising in the UK should have ad libraries and should provide more detailed and accurate information such as the targeting, actual reach and amount spent on those adverts to enhance transparency and scrutiny about election campaigning.

We have also recommended creating a clearer new overarching duty on platforms operating in the UK to cover a wider range of risks to elections, to ensure they take action to mitigate risks and protect legitimate political debate, particularly during critical election periods. This would help provide clarity and a shared understanding of what actions are needed by platforms during elections and provide a clearer basis for other regulators such as Ofcom to take enforcement action if appropriate actions are not taken.