New report shows social media giants obstruct independent research for political online safety

A new report by academics at Royal Holloway has highlighted the scale of obstruction major social media platforms are creating for researchers looking into political online safety.

The study, Academic Access to Social Media Data for the Study of Political Online Safety, was brought together by Dr Andreu Casas, Georgia Dagher, and Professor Ben O'Loughlin from the Department of Politics at Royal Holloway.

Political online safety refers to protecting people's political attitudes and behaviour, and political institutions and processes more generally, from online threats - including taking proactive actions that make the community more capable of combating these threats, such as improved digital literacy.

Some of the most pressing threats include, among others, misinformation, foreign operations, and hateful content. These have direct real-world political consequences, ranging from a loss of trust in political authorities, polarisation, extremism, physical violence, and democratic decay.

The study shows what this means for society and democracy, especially in light of Meta ceasing the use of factcheckers right when Generative AI makes mis/disinformation more sophisticated, and TikTok being accused of threatening the national security of Western countries.

Today, social media plays a key role in politics. An increasing number of people rely on social media for consuming news, learning about, and engaging in politics.

There are clear political benefits to the emergence of social media platforms, such as it being easier for minorities and marginalised groups to have a voice in public debates. However, there are also clear political harms, such as people being more easily exposed to extremist views and to increasingly realistic fake news.

Dr Andreu Casas, from Royal Holloway, said: "We have submitted our report to Ofcom's Call for Evidence: Researchers' access to information from regulated online services. We provide evidence for the report that Ofcom must produce under the Online Safety Act about researchers' access to information from online services to study online safety matters.

"The ability of independent researchers to study the political ramifications of social media platforms is under threat as platforms limit data access to academics. The EU is already pushing platforms to revert this trend, yet other governments, such as the UK, are lagging behind. Tech CEOs will likely form a united front with President Trump to revert and fight the regulation of tech companies in the US and abroad. Ofcom and parliament must act now to preserve the independent scrutiny of online platforms in the UK."

Professor Ben O'Loughlin, from Royal Holloway, added: "This report and its findings matter for a simple reason.

"The prevention of research on platforms means the prevention of knowledge about threats on platforms, which means prevention of action against those threats."

The goal of the report is to discuss the threats that social media pose to society and democracy, particularly in light of recent development in Generative AI and platform ownership.

It also details what data researchers need for conducting independent research on online safety and discusses the challenges they currently face. Finally, it advocates for the creation of a new independent body to foster, manage, and oversee academic platform research.

The report builds on, and aims to contribute to, parallel efforts in other countries.