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Data-fueled neurotargeting could kill democracy
Left unchecked, the technique, which weaponizes emotional data for political gain, could erode the foundations of a fair and informed society.
As Briant explained, modern neurotargeting techniques can be traced back to experiments undertaken by U.S. intelligence agencies in the early years of the 21st century that used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) machines to examine the brains of subjects as they watched both terrorist propaganda and American counterpropaganda. As Briant has documented, one of the major sources of data used to help the Trump campaign came from a “personality test” fielded via Facebook by a Cambridge University professor working on behalf of CA, who ostensibly collected the responses for scholarly research purposes only. CA then used its data-sharing relationship with right-wing disinformation site Breitbart and developed partnerships with other media outlets in order to experiment with various fear-inducing political messages targeted at people with established neurotic personalities — all, as Briant detailed, to advance support for Trump.
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