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2026Taiwan Local Elections

and National Referendum Case 22Election Day: Sat, Nov 28

SourceCampaign News

Legislators warn against information manipulation ahead of local elections

Tomasz Koper

Legislators from two major parties have warned against information manipulation ahead of the coming November local elections. Taiwan’s National Security Bureau (NSB) recently submitted a report to the Legislature which says that between January to September intelligence teams reported more than 2.5 million controversial messages spread by suspicious accounts.

According to NSB statistics, Facebook’s share of the controversial messages rose from 43.6 percent to 68.9 percent, while Threads saw a rise from 4.5 percent to 9 percent. They cover topics including energy, food safety, and national defense policy, as well as specific candidates’ platforms, images, and local development projects.

DPP legislator Rosalia Wu (吳思瑤) said in an interview on Wednesday, October 21, that the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) election interference methods keep changing and getting worse. She said the operations begin with Chinese state media and online outlets setting narratives that attack specific candidates. These are then repeated by some Taiwanese outlets, politicians, and pundits, which forms a cognitive warfare chain. Wu noted that the DPP candidate for Taipei mayor Puma Shen (沈伯洋) is a top priority of disinformation efforts, and urged the public to psychologically prepare for smear campaigns.

KMT legislator Kin Cyang (黃仁) said CCP united front work and cognitive warfare against Taiwan have always existed and do not appear only around elections. He noted that AI-processed voices and images are already extremely lifelike, and that some people in Taiwan are using such technology. He called on elected representatives to be on guard and take precautions.

The NSB said that in addition to information manipulation, government internet services faced an average of almost 2.6 million intrusion attempts per day, with an upward trend since June. The bureau said it cannot rule out that the CCP is gathering intelligence and preparing intrusions in order to interfere with November’s elections.

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