Whether they are peddling fake news, or counterfeit products, or bogus services, and regardless of where they are run, these sites should have no space in social media platforms.

Sham treatments harm the body, and scams rob people of money.

But the most dangerous swindle are lies that destroy our democratic fabric, poison civil discourse, subvert science, cover up dismal performance and make public agencies less accountable.

This early, regardless of our political affiliation, we should work as one in making sure that no offshore black propaganda operations would mar the 2022 elections.

Foreign troll factories should be blocked from polluting the 2022 elections. Let the latter’s results be based on the free and informed choice of our people, and not on manufactured stories designed to mislead them. When unleashed in our elections, this virus is as dangerous as malwares in ballot counting machines.

The Comelec and the DICT should work as one on this, on how to install a firewall that would keep alien-generated or alien-funded content from fomenting hatred and widening the division among our people.

They should ensure that our submarine cables will not end up as puppet strings that can sway voting choices and dictate the outcome of a political exercise that should be limited to Filipinos alone.

We should begin devising ways on how to detect and repel foreign interference in the 2022 polls.

I don’t believe that candidates will be in cahoots with alien interests, and I know that as patriots they will not condone an intrusion even if it is meant for their benefit. But nothing prevents foreign agents who have so much at stake here from propping up their favored candidate and pulling down the ones they dislike. (###)