INEC blames registration officers for AI-generated photos in voter register
by Moronfolu Adeyemi · The Eagle OnlineThe Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has blamed irregularities by some registration officers for the appearance of suspected artificial intelligence-generated photographs in its preliminary register of voters.
The commission’s Director of Information and Communication Technology, Dr Lawrence Bayode, disclosed this on Friday during an interview on Arise Television, saying some registration officers used their authorised login details to introduce questionable records into the database.
Bayode said the commission uncovered the irregularities through its Automated Biometric Identification System (ABIS), which was deployed to examine the voter registration records.
“We have registration officers on the field. And these registration officers, they have login details to log into the system.
“So what we have found is that some of these registration officers, not all of them now, some of them across the states nationwide, they’ve done different things to bring these irregularities onto the register,” he said.
He explained that while some of the questionable photographs were generated using artificial intelligence, others were products of poor registration procedures.
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“Some of these pictures are AI-generated. Some of them not AI-generated, but very bad registration.
“And this thing got into the register by the registration officers and because they have access to register people,” Bayode said.
The ICT director added that the commission had identified the affected records and established how some of the irregularities occurred but could not determine why the officers introduced them.
“When the ABIS was run on the system, we saw these people. We know what they did. We know how they did it. But honestly, I don’t know why,” he added.
Bayode said INEC had begun cleaning up the voter register before publishing its preliminary version, noting that the commission was working within the statutory 90-day period for completing the exercise.
His disclosure follows public concerns over suspicious photographs and other irregularities discovered after INEC uploaded its preliminary voter register to its website on October 26.
Screenshots circulated on social media reportedly showed photographs suspected to have been generated using artificial intelligence attached to voter records in parts of Edo State.
Other concerns raised included alleged duplicate entries and complaints by some registered voters that their details were missing from the online register.
INEC had earlier explained that the online version was the same preliminary register physically displayed at Registration Areas nationwide between October 9 and 15 for the Display, Claims and Objections exercise.
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