Imagine waking up one morning to a voice note from a relative urging you not to vote because “the election has been cancelled,” or watching a video of an electoral official confessing to a fraud that never happened. It sounds like the plot of a dystopian film, but Nigeria’s electoral commission says this is exactly the kind of scenario that could become common in the 2027 general elections if citizens are not careful. The Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, has issued a serious warning: the misuse of generative artificial intelligence is no longer a distant or theoretical threat, but a…

Tuesday morning in the quiet communities between Westby and Ontario, where the hills roll green and the roads are usually empty enough to hear a truck shifting gears a mile away, had begun in an unremarkable way. Children waited for school buses, shopkeepers turned over their Closed signs, and the first few customers of the day pulled into the parking lot of Westby’s Bank of Ontario. It is the kind of place where tellers recognize familiar faces, where a conversation about the weather often comes before a transaction, and where nothing more dramatic than a cash draw being stuck is…