Nigeria: Banks Lose N7.3 Billion to Cybercrime Annually

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Leadership (Abuja)

29 August 2008
Posted to the web 29 August 2008

Isaac Aimurie

It has been revealed that Nigerian banks lose over N7.3 billion annually to cybercrime related activities, even as available data estimates that the global economy loses more than $200 billion annually in direct and related damages to cybercrime and threatens world peace and security.

Disclosing this yesterday, the Chief Executive Officer of the Global Network for Cyber Solution – a non-governmental and not-for-profit organisation, Mr. Segun Olugbile, also stated that as the sixth largest oil producer in the world and the largest single concentration of people of African descent under the universe, Nigeria does not have any reliable law to deal with Cybercrime.

Olugbile also said that the banking sector, as one of the most strategically important sectors that have direct socio-economic impact on the lives and business of average citizens, needs protection from cyber-criminality, considering the huge amount of funds lost in that sector annually.

He pointed out that some of the rampant cyber corrupt practices in the banking sector include online financial fraud inside-out, identity theft, system penetration by outsiders, data and network sabotage and denial of service attacks.

Olugbile, whose organisation convened a national stakeholders' conference on cybercrime and cyber security to address the challenging issues and their impact on Nigeria, noted that the quantum effect of the emerging monstrous challenge of cybercrime to developing economies translates into a colossal digital nightmare to the African continent and, indeed, particularly to Nigeria.

He added that there are reliable case studies to prove that an attack on a national infrastructure could, by virtue of its catastrophic consequences, completely paralyze the machinery of government, pointing out that national security remains perhaps the most critical and mandatory imperatives for actualizing sustainable national development and global peace which must be addressed by the 7-point agenda of President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua.

Various speakers and participants at the conference called on the government to declare cybercrime and cybersecurity as a national emergency, which deserves conscious political will and special budgetary resources to effectively engage the challenges presented by its impact. They also called on legislators to enact into law National Information Infrastructure (NIIA) Act, provide legislative framework for cyber crime and security and establish Cyber Crime Reporting and Response Centre and Cybercrime and Cybersecurity Training Centre.

Other recommendations at the conference included establishment of National Emergency Response Framework on Cybercrime and cyber security; establishment of Cyber Police and Forensics Commission; establishment of Cyber Space Technology Development Agency; establishment of National Institution for Cyber Space Infrastructure Protection

The conference also urged the National Assembly to enact into law several Acts which include: National Cyber Crime and Cyber Security Act; National Cyber Space Technology (CST) Act; National Cyber Space Technology (CST) Infrastructure Act; National Cyber Space Technology Intellectual Property Act; National Electronic Commerce and Payment Act; and National Cybercrime and Cybersecurity Complaint Centre.

The participants also called on the government to constitute a National Standing Committee on Cybercrime and Cybersecurity and establish special courts for cybercrime and cybersecurity proceeding.

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