A influência das fakenews nas eleições brasileiras nos anos de 2018 a 2024: os impactos da desinformação no pleito de 2024 em Fortaleza

Abstract

Fake news has become a global phenomenon with significant impacts on democratic processes, including elections. In Brazil, the dissemination of false information has gained prominence especially during elections, influencing public opinion, polarizing debates and challenging democratic institutions. This monograph analyzes the phenomenon of fake news in the context of Brazilian elections in the time frame that includes the years 2018 to 2024, with a special focus on the Municipal elections of Fortaleza in the year 2024, exploring its impacts, the challenges faced to combat it and the strategies adopted by different social, political and legal actors. These disruptive events of fake news and disinformation, which occurred more intensely during election periods, are analyzed in this work as social and political phenomena, which managed to invade homes and imaginations, especially through social networks, with the expansion of the use of specific algorithms and digital bubbles. Our research showed that it is no longer just the press that produces and disseminates information, but rather all those who exist in some way in the digital environment. We analyzed the role of the Electoral Court in combating fake news in the context of the Brazilian elections. We explored the legal, operational and collaborative strategies adopted by the institution to mitigate the impacts of disinformation on democracy, highlighting case studies of recent electoral processes (2018 and 2024). The study also addresses challenges related to freedom of expression, technological limitations and the effectiveness of measures implemented by the Legislative and Judicial Branches, highlighting the need to improve what we currently have to combat the dissemination of false information, since the solutions found at the moment do not offer concrete and effective responses to combat fake news. We therefore conclude that although we have made progress in combating fake news, the dynamics of the behavior of those who disseminate it outweigh the interventions carried out by the judiciary, given the procedural rules to be followed, as well as the changes proposed by the legislature, considering the tensions that occur in partisan conflicts, in addition to the ideological factor. Therefore, it is urgent to create more advanced mechanisms to combat the circulation of messages with inaccurate content, update the laws and make efforts to ensure that democratic institutions regain the necessary credibility before the population, being effectively capable of acting in the fight against the criminality of fake news.