The basic remit of the news is to shed light how we are being governed. In other words, the ways that power is being used over us.

All applications of power are currently moving into the digital age.

We journalists (i.e. the watchdogs of power) must find ways to track the digital exercise of power in real time much as we do in the physical world.

Take politics, for example.

Throughout the age of democracy, election campaigns have been held openly. In the 19th century, the press followed American presidential candidates from city to city, telling their readers if a candidate promised something in one city and made a completely different promise in the next. This is becoming extraordinarily difficult as political power shifts onto the web. In social media, it is possible to promise all sorts of good things to everyone without having to answer for it.

News journalism can no longer look from a distance wondering about the algorithmic use of power.

It would be just as silly as writing a political piece about Parliament while standing on the steps outside the building, trying to figure out what was going on inside by staring at its walls.

One election - a million different interpretations

The digital/algorithmic exercise of power is more than mere direct interference. The digital exercise of power is microtargeted persuasion, in which the message is customised to suit individual perceptions or life situations.

In the use of power this is the new normal.

Robots make it all too easy to produce microtargeted messaging in social media. They persuade people to see, for example, a political issue only from a certain point of view - one that fits the recipient's psychological profile. This enhances the effectiveness of persuasion. It is possible to make thousands of different kinds of advertisements in a single day.

Or actually, in a matter of minutes.

This same type of microtargeting has long been used in commercial marketing and it isn't inherently evil - or new, for that matter. A jacket will be marketed to you at a 20% discount only today, and no one else will see that same ad. I, on the other hand, will be sold something else entirely, and the ad will appear right when its impact is assumed to be optimal. This can help the consumer make better decisions, if they aren't inundated with an avalanche of advertisements.

To put it in the simplest terms, people live physically in the same society, but virtually in entirely different societies with entirely different problems.

The highly developed microtargeting used in the political exercise of power creates a situation in which demographic groups voting in the same election experience the themes of the election in such completely different ways that it is impossible to even discuss the themes with these other groups. To put it in the simplest terms, people live physically in the same society, but virtually in entirely different societies with entirely different problems. An even worse situation is when microtargeted communications can be used to reduce the desire of specific demographic groups to participate or even just vote.

The watchdog of power is incapable of revealing the algorithmic power. The algorithmic exercise of power is not open. Indeed, the algorithms owned by social media companies are considered business secrets. The exercise of power is a business transaction between the purchaser of microtargeting and the social media company. A very basic level of microtargeting can be experienced right there on any Facebook app. It is possible to reach 200 people fitting a very particular description for about ten euros.

The political and economic exercise of power is becoming increasingly opaque.

Your average citizen or even the watchdog of power itself can no longer see where the power is at any given time. This is because power and politics have, in many cases, been transformed into business secrets.

This is not acceptable.

The writer is the Head of Yle News Lab. In the summer of 2018, he worked as an international stipendiary at the Wilson Center, which is a think-tank chartered by the United States Congress.