The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and media stakeholders have raised the alarm over the growing threat of Artificial Intelligence (AI)-generated misinformation to the credibility of the 2027 general elections, warning that fake election results, deepfake videos and manipulated audio could mislead voters and undermine public confidence in the electoral process.
INEC said advances in generative AI had made fabricated audio, video and images cheaper to produce and considerably harder to detect, while journalists warned that false election information could spread through social media faster than professional journalists and fact-checkers could verify or debunk it.
INEC Chairman, Joash Amupitan, raised the concern in Abuja at a Capacity Building Workshop for Public Affairs Officers (PAOs), declaring that the danger posed by AI-generated misinformation was “no longer a distant, theoretical risk” to the commission.
The media stakeholders, separately, sounded a similar warning at the 8th Bagauda Kaltho Media Lecture Series organised by the Africa Media Development Foundation (AMDF), where they identified fabricated election results, deepfake videos and manipulated audio as emerging threats ahead of the polls.
Represented by National Commissioner and Chairman, Information and Voter Education Committee (IVEC), Mohammed Kudu Haruna, Amupitan said AI was changing the information environment in which elections were conducted.
“Generative AI has made it cheaper and considerably harder to detect manipulated audio, video and images. Its misuse extends beyond fabricated content to targeted messaging capable of dividing voters along conflicting narratives,” he said.
The INEC chairman warned that election credibility could no longer be protected solely by securing ballot papers, Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) machines and result sheets.
“Election credibility today no longer depends only on ballot papers, BVAS machines and result sheets, but equally on the information environment in which voters form their judgments.
“Electoral technology and electoral communication should be treated not as separate concerns but as a single discipline,” he said.
Amupitan said the workshop, themed, “Strengthening PAOs Capacity for Credible, Verified and Responsible Election Communication Towards 2027,” was designed to prepare the commission’s frontline communicators for the challenge.
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He said the volume and speed of information about INEC and the electoral process would increase considerably as the elections approached, making verification, escalation and consistent messaging critical.
The journalists and media stakeholders, in a communiqué issued after the Bagauda Kaltho lecture, expressed similar concerns about the increasing deployment of AI to create deceptive election content.
They warned that misinformation and disinformation could spread on social media faster than journalists and fact-checkers could respond, making verification increasingly important for newsrooms.
The stakeholders called on media organisations to invest in continuous training in fact-checking, digital verification and artificial intelligence and strengthen newsroom systems for detecting and responding to false information before and during the elections.
They also urged technology companies and digital platforms to work with journalists, civil society and government institutions to develop mechanisms for identifying manipulated, synthetic and AI-generated content.
INEC Director of Voter Education and Publicity, Victoria Eta-Messi, said the commission operated under constant public scrutiny and was regularly confronted with attempts to misrepresent its activities and undermine public confidence.
“It is through you that Nigerians form much of their impression of who we are, what we stand for, and how reliable our information is,” she told the PAOs.
Eta-Messi said further capacity-building programmes were already at advanced stages of planning, describing the workshop as the beginning of sustained efforts to prepare INEC’s communication personnel for the responsibilities ahead.