Influence of Social Media on Security in Nigeria

Abstract

Social media platform has reengineered social interaction among peers, businesses, governments globally. Social media platforms are used in advancing social and national insecurity, such as the situation in some parts of Nigeria. For some years now, terrorism, kidnapping and ritualism have engulfed the Nigerian states by insurgent groups while separatist groups have also carried out demonstrations in the western and southern parts of Nigeria. Each of these groups is using various kinds of online media to propagate their agenda, and the general public also uses social media platforms to escalate this propaganda, which sometimes is fake news. The study adopted a descriptive survey research design. A sample of 51 (fifty-one) personnel of government institutions that oversee national security such as Nigerian Police, Civil Defense Corpse, Nigeria Immigration officer, Nigeria Army and members of National Drug Law Enforcement Agency in Agbara and Igbesa Area of Ado-Odo Ota Local Government, Ogun State were purposively selected due to vast geographical scope of intelligence gathering. Data were collected using Demographic data form and self-constructed questionnaire designed by the researchers. Data were analysed using descriptive statistics and regression analysis was used to test the hypothesis formulated at 0.05 level of significance. The findings revealed social media have significant effect on National security of Nigeria. It was concluded that social media can be used by law enforcement officers to detect and prevent security threats since social media social media intelligence is an indispensable technique that could be leveraged to investigate national security threats as security organs can collect and analyse social media content and or data with a view to drawing security strategic insights for evidence-based decision-making. It was recommended among others that social networking sites should be monitored for possible activities that may threaten the security of the nation, government and various relevant bodies should focus on policy development and public avareness campaigns to sensitize the public on how to utilize social media platforms well to
promote cohesion and peaceful coexistence.