The Independent National Electoral Commission has warned that the growing use of artificial intelligence to produce deceptive content could undermine public confidence in the 2027 general elections.
The commission also called for electoral technology and communication to be handled as an integrated discipline, stressing that the effectiveness of election technology depends largely on how well voters understand and trust the systems.
INEC Chairman, Prof Joash Amupitan, SAN, disclosed this on Wednesday in Abuja in a keynote address delivered on his behalf by a National Commissioner, Sani Adam, SAN, at the 13th Annual International Conference of the Association of Communication Scholars and Professionals of Nigeria.
The conference, themed, “Media, Technology and Elections in Africa: Navigating Digital Disruption and the New Dynamics of Electoral Communication,” brought together stakeholders to examine the impact of digital technology on elections.
According to a statement signed by INEC’s Director of Voter Education and Publicity, Victoria Eta-Messi, Amupitan said the commission’s credibility now depended not only on the integrity of the ballot, Bimodal Voter Accreditation System and result sheets, but also on voters’ understanding of and confidence in the electoral process.
He explained that the introduction of BVAS and the INEC Result Viewing Portal was aimed at improving transparency by enabling citizens to see polling-unit results before they are moved to collation centres.
However, he noted that the 2023 general elections demonstrated how technological challenges could fuel public suspicion when electoral systems failed to perform as expected.
“Legitimacy is earned only when systems perform reliably, are well understood, and are explained honestly when they fall short,” the statement read.
Speaking on preparations for the 2027 elections, the INEC chairman said the commission had commenced a comprehensive review of its electoral technology infrastructure.
He said the exercise would cover areas including system redundancy, penetration testing and disaster recovery arrangements, while INEC was also considering a mock presidential election to simulate election-day operations.
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According to him, the proposed exercise would allow the commission to assess the effectiveness of voter accreditation, result transmission and result viewing systems under conditions similar to those expected during the actual election.
Amupitan also expressed concern over the increasing ability of generative AI tools to produce convincing fake audio, videos and images that could be used to deceive voters.
He said the technology had reduced the cost of producing manipulated political material while making such content more difficult to identify, adding that fabricated political messages had already emerged during recent election cycles in West and East Africa.
“The danger lies not only in outright fabrication but also in algorithmic microtargeting, which allows conflicting messages to reach narrow segments of the electorate without a shared factual foundation,” he said.
He warned that AI-generated and manipulated material could spread to millions of social media users before fact-checkers or electoral authorities could establish whether the information was genuine.
The INEC chairman further disclosed that the commission had proposed a substantial budget for election technology and operations, including the acquisition of new accreditation devices to replace equipment lost or damaged during the previous election cycle.
He said the commission was yet to receive the full allocation, although its ICT team had already begun discussions with manufacturers as preparations for the technology audit and proposed mock election continued alongside the budget process.
To tackle emerging challenges in electoral communication, Amupitan outlined a five-point approach for INEC.
The measures include bringing technology and communication planning together, creating a rapid-response system capable of addressing false information within the same news cycle, openly communicating identified vulnerabilities and safeguards, strengthening partnerships with media scholars, fact-checkers and technology platforms, and sustaining investment in public media literacy.
Amupitan said INEC must move away from treating technology and communication as independent aspects of election management.
He called on media practitioners, technology specialists, academics and other stakeholders to collaborate with the commission in improving voters’ understanding of electoral systems and building confidence in the process ahead of the 2027 elections.