Broadcasting
Trusted AI Needs a Human at the Helm
By Linda Saunders, Salesforce Director, Solution Engineering Africa
AI promises to make our jobs easier, our work more productive, and our businesses more valuable. In fact, new research from Slack finds that 80% of employees using generative AI tools are experiencing a boost in productivity — and that’s just the beginning.
And, with the introduction of AI assistants — including Salesforce’s own Einstein Copilot — the potential for businesses is only growing. AI assistants can already answer questions, generate content, and dynamically automate actions. And someday, these assistants will become digital sales and service agents, anticipating our needs and operating on our behalf.
But with each new AI advancement comes new ethical concerns. It’s one thing if an AI assistant offers a bad product recommendation, but if it takes misguided actions on real-world concerns like personal finances or medical information — the stakes suddenly become much higher.
As we enter this new era of human-AI interaction, how can we harness the power of AI without opening ourselves up to dangerous risks?
Keeping a human at the helm
The AI revolution is an evolution. We’re taking quantum leaps forward every day, but we can’t always explain why AI does the things that it does — or eliminate every instance of inaccuracy, toxicity, or misinformation.
For these reasons, it’s important that we keep humans firmly in control of AI systems. But as AI becomes more and more sophisticated, it can be hard to figure out how to layer in that human touch. We’ve all heard of keeping “humans in the loop,” but with this new generation of AI, it’s sometimes just not realistic for us to engage in every AI interaction or review every AI-generated output.
That’s why, at Salesforce, we believe trusted AI needs a human at the helm. Instead of asking humans to intervene in every individual AI interaction, we’re designing more powerful, system-wide controls that put humans at the helm of AI outcomes and enable them to focus on the high-judgement items that most need their attention. In other words, humans aren’t always rowing the boat — but we’re very much steering the ship.
And with a human at the helm, we can design AI systems that leverage the best of human and machine intelligence. For example, we can unlock incredible efficiencies by tasking AI to review and summarise millions of customer profiles. And at the same time, we can build trust by empowering humans to lean in and use their judgement in ways that AI can’t.
Making AI a copilot, not an autopilot
There’s a reason this generation of AI products are called copilots and not autopilots. As AI becomes more powerful and autonomous — making decisions and taking actions on individuals’ behalf — keeping a human at the helm becomes even more important. By combining the capabilities of AI with the strength of human judgement, we can make AI more effective and trustworthy.
Here are three ways we’re keeping humans at the helm of Salesforce AI:
Prompt Builder Helps Us Automate in Authentic Ways: Prompts, or the instructions we send to generative AI models, are very powerful. A single, human-generated prompt can help guide millions of trusted outputs — but only if it’s constructed thoughtfully. With our newly announced Prompt Builder, we’re helping customers craft effective prompts by seeing the likely output in near real time to help ensure they get the AI outcome they want. We’ve also added different edit modes within Prompt Builder that allow users to tune and revise their prompts so they provide more helpful, accurate, and relevant results.
Audit Trails Help Us Spot What We’ve Missed: Our Einstein Trust Layer offers a robust audit trail that allows customers to assess AI’s track record and pinpoint where their AI assistant may have gone wrong — but also where AI went right. These features help identify issues across large datasets that humans might not spot; and can empower us to use our judgement to make adjustments based on the needs of our organisation. For example, Audit Trail can alert us when an AI tool’s outputs are flagged as “thumbs down” a certain number of times — a sign that the AI-generated outputs might not be meeting the business’ goals. And by aggregating implicit feedback signals, like how often users edit an output before using it, Audit Trail can give us a bird’s eye view of our systems, allowing us to identify trends and take action.
Data Controls Help Us Better Guard Our Data: AI is nothing without data. That’s why we’ve designed robust controls in Data Cloud — our fast-growing platform that helps bring siloed customer data together in one place — to help businesses securely action their data. Data Cloud features help organizations harness data for AI-powered insights and intelligence, while longstanding Salesforce core data controls like permission sets, access controls, and data classification metadata fields empower humans and AI models alike to protect and manage sensitive data.
Pioneering a new approach for the AI era
As the AI era continues to unfold, it’s critical that both humans and technology evolve along with it. The AI revolution is not just about technological innovation — it’s also about empowering humans to sit successfully at the helm of AI and use it in ways that are trustworthy and effective.
Our approach is evolving, and we are committed to continued research, learning, and multi-stakeholder collaboration on this topic. But with a human at the helm, we believe we can combine the best of human and machine intelligence for this new AI era — leaning into AI’s capabilities and freeing up humans to do what they do best: be creative, exercise their judgement, and connect more deeply with one another.
With AI and humans working together, we can create more productive businesses, more empowered employees, and ultimately, more trustworthy AI.
Federal government, yesterday, said that it will now launch the so-called FreeTV, with over 100 channels for news, sports, education, entertainment and children’s programming in multiple Nigerian languages on June 17.
National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) had initially scheduled for May 15 for the launch.
But the new date was announced by Mohammed Idris, minister of Information and National Orientation, on Wednesday during a facility tour of NIGCOMSAT, alongside Dr Charles Ebuebu, director general of the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) and other stakeholders.
Idris said the long-awaited migration from analogue to digital broadcasting had finally become a reality after years of failed attempts and delays, describing the project as a major breakthrough for Nigeria’s broadcasting industry.
“I have been grappling with this idea of the DSO for many years. Moving our transmissions from analogue to digital has now happened and is ready to be commissioned by June 17,” the minister said.
He revealed that several channels had already been bundled onto the platform, adding that the digital transition would transform broadcasting, advertising and television consumption across Nigeria and Sub-Saharan Africa.
According to him, the new platform introduces scientific audience measurement tools capable of tracking viewership patterns in real time, thereby giving advertisers reliable data for targeted campaigns.
“Now science is at play. If you are viewing a station, we know who is watching what and how many people are watching. Advertisers can now take informed decisions about the kind of programming Nigerians want to watch across all demographics,” Idris stated.
The minister said the collaboration between NIGCOMSAT, NBC, the Ministry of Communications and the Ministry of Information had made the digital transition possible, while commending President Bola Tinubu for providing the necessary support and resources.
He described previous DSO efforts as limited and expensive due to encrypted set-top boxes but noted that the new system would be free and accessible to millions of Nigerians.
“In the past, the boxes were encrypted and costly. Now this is free. Government has taken off some of those costs on behalf of Nigerians,” he said.
Idris stressed that unlike earlier pilot phases restricted to a few cities, the new digital platform would have nationwide and regional reach through NIGCOMSAT’s satellite infrastructure.
“Everybody can now watch whatever he wants in real time and painlessly. Free TV everywhere for everybody”, he declared.
The minister also hinted that the platform would challenge the dominance of existing pay-TV operators by offering Nigerians wider viewing options at no cost.
“I don’t want to always use the word ‘substitute’, but this offers opportunities you didn’t get before. You no longer have that monopoly again. Competition is going to set in. Content will grow and viewership will grow,” he said.
He added that the platform would initially launch in standard definition, SD, before quickly transitioning to high definition, HD, bringing Nigerian broadcasting in line with global standards.
“Soon after the launch, we are moving to HD. Nigeria will now compete globally. What you watch here is what you get anywhere,” Idris said.
The minister further disclosed that the service was already available via mobile application and had successfully undergone testing ahead of the official unveiling.
Also speaking during the tour, managing director and chief executive officer of NIGCOMSAT, described the collaboration between NIGCOMSAT and NBC as a strategic partnership that has strengthened service delivery and raised operational standards within Nigeria’s digital broadcasting ecosystem.
According to her, ongoing investments and satellite expansion plans under the current administration will guarantee reliable and continuous service delivery.
“The work has only just started. The work has only just begun,” she said.
Among those who accompanied the Honourable Minister on the tour were Salihu Abdullahi Dembos, director-general, Nigerian Television Authority (NTA); Jibrin Baba Ndace, director-general, Voice of Nigeria (VON); Mohammed Bulama, director-general, Federal Radio Corporation of Nigeria (FRCN); and Lanre Issa-Onilu, director-general, National Orientation Agency (NOA), alongside other senior government officials and dignitaries.
Metro Digital Limited, a licenced Indigenous broadcasting organisation, has accused Multichoice, pay television company, of refusing to obey judgements emanating from Courts in Nigeria.
It said the latest of such judgements is the one that was delivered by Justice Chinelo Odili of Rivers State High Court on May 4, 2026 in Suit No. PHC/3943/FHR/2025.
Dr. Paul Osuji, operations manager of Metro Digital, at a press conference in Port Harcourt, Rivers State,
said the suit was filed by the organisation and two others against Multichoice and the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).
Osuji stated that Justice Odili has in the judgement described the arrest of a staff member of the company and the carting away of it’s properties and disruption of it’s broadcasting business by the EFCC over a civil dispute of copyrighy as unlawful and violations of the applicants’ rights.
The manager recalled that in October 2025, Multichoice instigated the EFCC to read their office in Port Harcourt, arrested a staff of the company and staff of another company, while the suit was still pending.
“On October 16, 2025, the premises of Metro Digital Limited, a licenced indigenous broadcasting organisation was raided by the Nigerian anti-graft agency, EFCC, instigated by Multichoice Nigeria, purportedly acting on a preservation order made by the Federal High Court sitting in Port Harcourt over the sub licensing of broadcasting content right.
“The preservation order came from a civil dispute already adjudicated by the Court of Appeal No. CA/CS/188/2021 – Multichoice Vs Metro Digital Limited and 20 others, which is a subject of a pending appeal -No. SC/CV/1248/2022 -Multichoice and 20 others before the Supreme Court.
“Instructively, while suit No. PHC/ 3943/ FHR/2025 was still pending, Metro Digital Limited filed an application to set aside the said preservation orders of the Federal High Court sitting in Port Harcourt and presided over by Hon. Justice A.T Mohammed.
“In his ruling delivered on December 10, 2025, set aside the preservation orders and it’s legal execution on Metro Digital Limited. The court also ordered EFCC to return unconditionally all the properties and records of Metro Digital Limited, illegally and unlawfully carted away during the raid but the agency has till today not obeyed those orders of the Court,” he said.
Metro Digital Limited is known for operating SLTV, a direct-to-home satellite television service launched to provide affordable, locally-owned alternatives to international pay TV
A Federal High Court in Lagos has restrained the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) from sanctioning or punishing broadcast stations and presenters over the expression of personal opinions, alleged bullying of guests, or failure to maintain neutrality on air.
NBC
Justice Daniel Osiagor granted the interim injunction following an ex parte application filed by the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) and the Nigerian Guild of Editors (NGE).
The court specifically restrained the NBC, its officers, agents and affiliated persons from enforcing its recently issued “Formal Notice” or imposing sanctions, fines or penalties on broadcasters based on provisions of the 6th Edition of the Nigeria Broadcasting Code, pending the hearing and determination of the substantive suit.
SERAP and NGE had approached the court to challenge what they described as an arbitrary and unlawful move by the commission to punish broadcasters for allegedly expressing personal opinions as facts, bullying or intimidating guests, or failing to maintain neutrality during programmes.
The groups also asked the court to determine whether the provisions of the Nigeria Broadcasting Code relied upon by NBC were inconsistent with the 1999 Constitution, as amended, and Nigeria’s international human rights obligations.
The suit followed an April statement by the NBC in which it raised concerns over what it described as increasing violations of the broadcasting code across news, current affairs and political programmes.
The commission had warned that presenters who expressed personal opinions as facts or bullied guests during live broadcasts would be sanctioned.
However, Justice Osiagor, in his ruling, held that pending the hearing of the substantive matter, the commission must refrain from using the formal notice to threaten, sanction or punish broadcast organisations and on-air personalities under the contested code provisions.
The matter was adjourned until June 1, 2026, for hearing of the motion on notice.
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