The Independent National Electoral Commission has flagged 268 records in its preliminary Register of Voters for suspected artificial intelligence-generated photographs and other irregularities, as it begins a process to clean up the database ahead of the 2027 general elections.
The commission’s Director of Information and Communication Technology, Lawrence Bayode, disclosed this on Channels Television’s Sunday Politics, explaining that the Automated Biometric Identification System had identified the questionable records for further examination.
“What we are currently doing now is looking at all these 268 records that ABIS already flagged as AI-generated or even something of irregularities,” he said.
READ ALSO: Police rescue 10-year-old boy in Anambra, seek public assistance to locate family
Bayode explained that some individuals allegedly exploited a special registration option designed for persons with disabilities who have incomplete fingers or no fingers to create questionable voter profiles.
He said the option, known as special registration, was among the loopholes allegedly exploited by those responsible for the irregularities detected by the system.
The ICT director said the commission had commenced the process of removing the affected records from the preliminary register.
“Those that we have seen, we are cleaning up,” Bayode said.
He, however, clarified that photographs enhanced with artificial intelligence would not automatically lead to the exclusion of affected voters, distinguishing between genuine photographs improved with AI applications and images generated entirely by artificial intelligence.
“Those that we know it is the AI on the phone that helped enhance their pictures, we can’t exclude such people because it was the AI on the phone that does that.
“Such people will still be on the register but those AI-generated, those photographs, all these will be removed. We are already looking at them,” he said.
The development followed the publication of INEC’s preliminary Register of Voters on its website on October 26, which triggered public outrage after screenshots circulated on social media showing suspicious photographs attached to voter records, particularly in parts of Edo State.
The controversy also generated concerns over alleged duplicate registrations, the appearance of names of deceased persons and complaints by some registered voters that their details were missing from the online register.
The concerns attracted reactions from political leaders, civil society figures and other Nigerians, who questioned the credibility of the registration process and demanded explanations from the electoral commission.
Culled from The Punch
