For years, Nigeria had carried on without any legal framework protecting her digital economy even with investments running into billions of dollars, thus the country had remained one of the safest havens for cyber criminals and digital fraudsters.
Yearly, billions of naira are being lost to the web criminals who on daily basis get more sophisticated and their victims cut across government establishments, corporate organisations, financial institutions and individuals.
Obviously, the incessant outcry by stakeholders in the ICT industry had heightened the need for a cyber crime law when several bills had failed to see the light of the day. And belatedly, the latest cybercrime bill was signed into law by the former President Goodluck Jonathan in the twilight of his administration last year, raising hopes that the country would be able to nip the crimes in the bud with the existence of the law.
Unfortunately, the hopes seem misplaced after all. Eight months after the law came into force, nothing seems to have changed. As a matter of fact, cybercrime activities have been on the increase even as the perpetrators get more sophisticated by the day. The last few months had seen increased cyber crime activities, while a recent report indicated that the year 2015 recorded high number of phishing emails from suspected cyber criminals in Nigeria, peaking when Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) announced deadline for Bank Verification Number (BVN).
Cyber criminals swamped unwary bank customers with phish emails to warn them that their accounts were about to be blocked and consequently steal their credentials once they supply their details. The year also saw home grown cyber criminals moving a step further by using Remote Administration Tools (RAT) and other malware tools as part of their phishing attack. In the same year 2015, a government agency was unknowingly serving a webmail phishing site from its own government (.gov.ng) domain. The phishing content was based on a ready-to-go phishing kit that is distributed as a zip file. It contains easily-customisable PHP scripts and images designed to trick victims into surrendering either their Yahoo, Gmail, Hotmail or AOL passwords.
The above revelations clearly show that if unchecked, cyber crime could wreak untold damage on the economy of this country especially with the CBN’s new cash-less policy. The task of tackling cyber crime is enormous but it is a war no serious nation like Nigeria with a large economy must lose. Developed nations across the world are taking the war against cyber crime seriously with establishment of cyber crime agency and policy frame work to tackle the scourge.
Unfortunately, Nigeria has done little over the past years in fighting this war. Over the years, several bills on cyber crime had been pushed to the National Assembly by the Nigerian IT experts, but none scaled through the final reading on the floor of the Senate. Many of the bills did not even get a mention, until the last one cyber crime bill was approved by Senate and eventually signed into law by former President Jonathan in May 2015.
Ideally, the coming into effect of the law over eight months now should have made some difference, rather, cyber crime is on a higher scale. Provisions of the law stipulates seven years imprisonment for offenders of all kinds of computer related fraud, computer related forgery, cyber-pornography, cyber-stalking and cyber-squatting. It also criminalises certain acts and omissions in the regional and international best practices and provision of procedural guidelines for the investigation of such offenses and defines the liability of service providers and ensures that national interest is not compromised by the use of electronic communications. Above all, it provides a legal framework for the prohibition and punishment of electronic fraud and cyber crime whilst promoting e-government services, electronic communications and transactions between public and private bodies as well as institutions and individuals.
But the questions are: Who has been prosecuted under this law over the past eight months? Why are those perpetrating cyber crimes still having field day despite the legal framework? How and when will Nigeria begin to monitor, apprehend and then prosecute perpetrators? What mechanisms are being put in place in practical terms to enforce the law?
The unfortunate situation at hand is such that we have a law we do not prepare to enforce and the crimes continue unfettered. We therefore call on the government to as a matter of urgency begin enforcement of this law.
Relevant enforcement agents should be empowered to do their work with a view to bringing perpetrators of cyber crimes and other criminals to book. Perhaps by then we will be able to rescue the Nigerian cyberspace from the web marauders.