2027: INEC flags staff in 10 states over AI voter photos

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has removed artificial intelligence-generated photographs uploaded to the national voters’ register and flagged officials implicated in the practice across 10 states for disciplinary action. INEC National Commissioner, Mohammed Haruna, disclosed this on Wednesday during a webinar organised by the PUNCH Media Foundation, titled, ‘AI, Misinformation and Nigeria’s 2027 Elections: Safeguarding the Truth, Protecting the Vote’.

Haruna, who is also Chairman of the commission’s Information and Voter Education Committee, described the development as a major challenge, noting that the commission had already taken down AI-generated photographs identified on the voters’ register. He, however, acknowledged that INEC faced limitations in preventing members of the public from manipulating or enhancing their photographs before uploading them during voter registration.

The commissioner said the commission had also identified cases involving its own personnel and was taking steps to address the violations. “We have already seen one of the challenges, which is that a lot of AI-generated photographs were posted onto the voters’ register, which, as we have said, we have had to take down,” he said. Haruna explained that while it might be difficult for the commission to prevent members of the public from manipulating their photographs before submission, it had greater control over violations involving its officials.

“But the ones involving our own staff, where it is our own staff that did so, that one is within our control. We are in the process of addressing it. They have been flagged,” he said. He disclosed that the commission had obtained the names of the officials involved across about 10 states, adding that they would face disciplinary action. “We have their names across about 10 states, and obviously, they are going to face disciplinary action,” he added.

On INEC’s preparedness to regulate the use of artificial intelligence in the electoral process ahead of the 2027 general elections, Haruna said the commission had developed an AI policy but was working to finalise it. He noted that the rapid evolution of artificial intelligence had created regulatory challenges for countries across the world, including advanced democracies.

According to him, the evolving nature of the technology has made it difficult for governments to establish comprehensive and specific regulatory frameworks. “As you know very well, it is new territory out there. Even the most advanced countries don’t have what you might call concrete, specific policies about AI because these things are evolving,” he said.

Haruna, however, said INEC had developed ideas on how it intended to deploy and regulate the technology, assuring that the policy would soon be finalised and made available to the media. “But we have at least some ideas of what we want to do and how we want to use that. We have that policy. Very soon, we will concretise it, and we will be able to share it with the media,” he said.