The subversion of democracy by spreading fake news using technology is not a theoretical danger and is not even a purely post-AI phenomenon. Notoriously, in 2016, Russian bot factories spread such a torrent of targeted fake news into specific American Facebook users’ accounts that it secured Donald Trump’s presidential victory despite him not winning the popular vote. It did this by Facebook assisting these bot programmers by providing them with detailed user data – likes, dislikes, preferences, demographic details and so on – such that enough voters in swing states were tricked into turning to Trump
