TOLLE LEGE Volume 6 Number 1 2024

DIGITAL RESPONSIBILITY IN NIGERIA THROUGH KANTIAN ETHICS: APPLYING IMMANUEL KANT'S CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE TO DATA PRIVACY, SURVEILLANCE, AND ONLINE MISINFORMATION IN NIGERIA'S DIGITAL ECONOMY

Chinedu S. Ifeakor, PhD.
Abstract

The African nation of Nigeria has a fast-growing digital economy, which generates 14.4 percent of the national GDP, and as a result, poses severe ethical dilemmas in data privacy, surveillance, and misinformation. The present paper uses the categorical imperative of Immanuel Kant to analyze the digital responsibility in the technological realm of Nigeria. This analysis shows how Kantian ethics can be used to provide a solid guide to solving modern digital dilemmas through an analysis of laws already existing, enforcement procedures, and online habits. The results indicate that there are great loopholes between the existing procedures and ethical considerations especially when considering digital citizens as the ends and not the means of exploiting data. The study is relevant to the scholarship of digital ethics in the new economies and gives applicable policy suggestions based on the moral philosophy. 

Keywords:
Copyright © 2026 ACJOL.