Search giant Google has been accused of manipulating American citizens to influence the outcome of the November midterm elections, according to a psychologist researcher.
Robert Epstein and his research team from the American Institute for Behavioral Research and Technology have been studying and monitoring online political content sent to voters in swing states.
The team is also investigating search engine results on Google and Bing tweets sent by Twitter, Gmail suppression, and auto-play videos suggested on Google-owned YouTube.
The study found over 1.9 million “ephemeral experiences” that Google was using to “shift opinions and voting preferences,” Epstein wrote in an article for the Daily Caller.
“Ephemeral experiences” is a term for short-lived content which immediately disappears without leaving a trace after user consumption.
As The Epoch Times reports:
The team expects such “ephemeral experiences” to number over 2.5 million by Election Day. Epstein has identified roughly a dozen new forms of online manipulation using ephemeral experiences, which are almost exclusively controlled by Google and a few other tech firms.
The impact created by the experiences is “stunning,” Epstein says.
Search engine results that favor one political candidate were found to influence undecided voters so much that up to 80 percent of such people in some demographic groups shifted their voting preferences after only a single search.