It means that for other laws, for other laws that takes effect, not necessarily our laws, right? It’s not necessarily the Anti-Fraud Act or the Digital Signature Act. It could be the Anti-Infiltration Act. At least the Anti-Infiltration Act now has a real trail to work with.

Right. So if they digitally sign it with their real name.

Yeah, but the text records and everything is then linked, right?

…they’ll have to sign it.

Exactly. Yes.

If it’s significantly sized, perhaps touching 10% of Taiwanese eyeballs or something like that, then we’re going to make it mandatory so that it registers a local presence so that we can do notice and delivery, and things like that.

And so the digital signature requirements is mandatory; it doesn’t matter whether they’re a firm or an individual. And the other thing is for foreign platforms such as TikTok, which doesn’t currently have a local representing entity.

And although we’re not competent authority of it today, we’re working with the Ministry of Economy on that. Hopefully, within a couple months, we will become the competent authority.

So, we care about end-user-facing internet advertisement platforms.

Yeah. So first of all, even if they’re individuals, like not a firm or anything, as long as they pay for a boost of their post, according to our definition, that’s an advertisement.

Do you mean that it’s using an organic account in the sense that it doesn’t even promote its own posts? Or do you find that to be quite rare?

They’re just normal advertisers.

That’s right.

And so, this fast response is also something that we are quite proud that we’ve been doing for quite a while, and we will continue to pre-bunk. And I would include deliberative assembly as a part of pre-bunking because talking very deeply for an entire day about such issues also ...

Because if you debunk way after the fact, then that actually causes conspiracy theories, and people want to push back and things like that. But if we pre-bunk, that is to say either debunk even before the information manipulation or right after information manipulation, like within one hour or so, ...

But still, I mean, it’s good to let people know that these things are coming, so that when they actually do see it, as we actually did leading up to the January election, by and large, it had no effect.The deepfake accounts, people see it as what it is, deepfakes. ...

I think in pre-bunking, certainly. Right. So pre-bunking is, for example, two years ago, I deepfaked myself posting an advertisement to the nation saying that it’s now possible for anyone with a MacBook with 12 hours of computation to deepfake me. Well, now, it’s like 12 milliseconds. [laughter]

Yes.

So that’s kind of overarching description. Feel free to ask questions.

With a microcosm of 450 Taiwanese citizens statistically represented in the population, and by and large, I think specifically for advertisement or other ways to use money to gain influence, they are in favor of both digital signature and also additional oversight of those large platforms.

So for things like this, the traditional parameter of cybersecurity management has been extended. We care about the integrity of information systems, but now information integrity outside of information systems is also something that we are concerned about, and we recently just had an online deliberative assembly about this very ...

We will also extend the measures on countering harmful products, because that clause was done in reaction to when Pelosi, the former US House Speaker, visited Taiwan. The signboards outside of Taiwan rail stations were displaying paid messages, and although we know it’s not part of the government service network, ...

But soon, with the new amendments currently in the cabinet, the Cyber Security Management Act, we’re going to extend that to also, like, government devices issued to government employees, or even in specific non-governmental institutions if they’re deemed to be part of the either critical infrastructure or state-owned enterprises, institutions ...

So basically, the foreign adversary can have indirect control on a product, which makes it a harmful product, which I understand is very similar to the current US House bill about TikTok. And so using that definition, we’ve already banned TikTok as a harmful product in public service, as well ...

In the upcoming draft, we define “harmful product” as a product, either software, hardware or service, that is under de facto control of an entity whose de facto control is in the hands of a foreign adversary.

And also, it will become very difficult for one person to impersonate 10 different people or 10,000 different people. So that is another part. And finally, specifically for TikTok, because it’s the only platform that’s both a significantly sized online advertisement platform, while simultaneously being a “harmful product” according to ...

So, soon, we will become also the competent authority of online advertisement platforms, which includes Facebook, Google, TikTok, the usual suspects. And so we are going to require all advertisers to use digital signature as a KYC process, meaning that it will no longer be possible for someone whose name ...

So within the Digital Signature Act, we now stipulate that we will have a stronger form of e-signature. We call it digital signature. The difference is that the digital signature is issued by a certificate authority that’s either the government itself, like our citizens’ digital certificate, or like recognized, approved ...

So our version is three years variously. The parties want one year or two years, and so on, so like, race to digital signature. This is because we have seen, in terms of information manipulation, either a person impersonating a celebrity via deepfake or whatever interactive AI generative forms, or ...

So, in terms of the actor behavior content separation, we’re at the upstream. We’re the actor layer, ensuring that there are verified actors, attributable provenance and so on. We’re also the competent authority for the Digital Signature Act, and so we have proposed an amendment, currently in the legislature, hopefully ...

This means, for example, having a clearly attributable source of sending messages either from the gov.tw, the single short URL, or from 111, the short SMS code, so that people can know that if there’s an SMS purporting to be from Taiwater or Taipower, and it doesn’t come from 111, ...

So nowadays, I say FIMI, or foreign information manipulation interference, to include the non-dis or misinformation part of effective polarization, and, by far, I think that’s the norm now, that the majority of the operations are centered around this. So at the moment, MoDA is the competent authority for e-commerce ...

So, a lot of it is now focused on what the researchers call effective polarization, like polarizing people’s hate toward each other, but not necessarily false, and if it’s not a false message, then, by definition, it’s not mis- or disinformation.

Yeah, so, well, if you have talked with either Doublethink Lab or with IORG or with Kuma Academy or the Mark’s C-LAB (2:39) and so on, I think they’re all—and AI Labs, I must not forget them, Infodemic—they’re all pointing out now that disinformation may not even be the majority ...

Sure.

We had a press conference talking about OneWeb, SES, joint cyber resilience, and so on. The local press seems to really like the idea.

Pretty good.

But this is very good room for photo opportunities.

Please take a seat. We don’t often use this meeting room because we’re quite far apart in this arrangement. [laughs]

Welcome.

Thank you.

Pleasure.

Okay, maybe we do our photo opportunity outside because there’s a cute moda logo. And you can put your stuff here.

Excellent! So, I reckon we have some gifts for you.

Thank you for visiting us.

Anything from Tim and Betty? Okay, great!

Great. Okay, that would be excellent. So, I will just look at all of these connecting flights in May and see how we do.

Great. Thank you.

But after May 20, then I will be much more clear on my travel schedules. And so, if an invitation around then comes, then I will be able to evaluate around early May.

Yeah, Sitra invited me to talk about how to use like deliberative polls to listen to all the population and so on. But I had to attend as a video conference because of travel arrangements, especially during parliamentary sessions. So, for November, I think I can evaluate around May because ...