Fortifying responsive architecture to clamp down on operating routes of Cybercrime

Crime rate in Nigeria has been topical in the discourse of social delinquencies ravaging the societal fabric of the Country. More of these escapades have been drawing concern at the international scene most recently, particularly with the expanding arm of cybercrime which has apparently grown beyond tolerable limit. The perpetrators of the crime are known to be developing tools of operation deployed to respond correspondingly as technology shift continue to surface. The tracking of the working lines of the networks of the enterprise have continued to bear records of evasion as the battle is being skewed to cluster the operating routes continually.

The ranking of Nigeria in the global records of cyber-crime has had the Country among the top list of the first 20 Countries which are well reckoned with as homes of cyber-crime escapades. The United States’ Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) had on Thursday published a report, which ranked Nigeria 16th among the top 20 International victim countries of cybercrime. The disclosure which explicitly stated the informing premise of the ranking according to the report titled: “2020 Internet Crime Report,” had read: “IC3 received a record number of complaints from the American public in 2020: 791,790, with reported losses exceeding $4.1 billion. This represents a 69% increase in total complaints from 2019. Business E-mail Compromise (BEC) schemes continued to be the costliest: 19,369 complaints with an adjusted loss of approximately $1.8 billion. Phishing scams were also prominent: 241,342 complaints, with adjusted losses of over $54 million. The number of Ransomware incidents also continues to rise, with 2,474 incidents reported in 2020. Public reporting is central to the mission and success of IC3. Submitting a cyber crime complaint to IC3.gov not only helps the FBI address specific complaints-and provide support and assistance to victims – but also helps us prevent additional crimes by finding and holding criminal actors accountable. Information reported to the IC3 helps the FBI better understand the motives of cyber-criminals, the evolving threat posed, and tactics utilized, enabling us to most effectively work with partners to mitigate the damage to victims.”

The records of Nigerians who have been gotten behind the bars for high profile cyber-crime of global profile have most recently drawn international attention. The case of Instagram influencer, Raymond Abbas, aka Hushpuppi, whose flamboyant lifestyle drew global attention that led to the tracking of his escapades, his arrest last year June by Dubai Police and subsequent transfer to the FBI in the US, is among the most recent cyber-crime kingpins with connections to the Country. According to the FBI, Abbas was a “key player” in a large conspiracy that allegedly provided “safe havens for stolen money around the world.” The arrest was part of a United States’ FBI investigation that unveiled Abbas as one of the kingpins of a transnational cybercrime network specializing in Business Email Compromise (BEC) scams, which is a fast-growing form of cyber-fraud that involves hacking corporate emails and sending fake messages to clients in order to redirect financial transfers and steal bank details.

It would be recalled that another Nigerian high profile internet fraudster, Obinwanne Okeke, also known as Invictus Obi, was on February 17, 2021, jailed for 10 years in the US over a cyber fraud scam that led to the theft of about $11m (£8m). The folk who pleaded guilty of the crime was a more refined fraudster posing as a successful entrepreneur. With his packaged posturing, he had featured on the Forbes 30-under-30 magazine cover, and had once spoken at the London School of Economics Africa Summit and at a point was attributed by the BBC as a “rising star.” Invictus Obi, had used Nigerian-based companies to defraud people in the US. His enterprise had used the instrumentality of phishing emails to steal funds from victims.

The rate of unemployment in the Country has been linked by social observers to be responsible for the preponderance of socio-economic escapades on the basis of which cyber-crime fixtures extremely. The grounds of the argument of the extending tentacles of the enterprise have been premised on the heightening of economic conditions characterised with troubling profile of unemployment, inflation and recession, which are believed to be harsh conditions warranting more Nigerians to divert their productive energy to criminal ventures. It would be recalled that a last year October report by the Nigeria Employers Consultative Association (NECA), revealed a 10 percentage point rise in the number of extreme poor people in the country, contrary to the 2019 report of the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS). The NECA’s report had revealed that the number of citizens in extreme poverty line stood at an estimated 102 million, representing 50 per cent of the Nigeria’s estimated population of about 205 million, as against the 40 per cent reported by NBS in October 2019. Figures released by the NBS on Monday had further revealed that Nigeria’s unemployment rate has worsened with a rise from 27.1 per cent in the second quarter (Q2) of 2020 to 33.3 per cent in the fourth quarter of 2020.

The profile of Nigeria’s image in the international realm has continued to wax gross with unwelcoming impacts on Nigerians in diaspora, among thousands seeking opportunities abroad. The image of any Country remains key to the influence it commands in the international realm of politics. It is therefore essential that the Nigerian Government redirect the course of stemming down the tide of cyber-crime from its nationals. The need to embrace diplomatic instruments of bilateral and multilateral pacts should be employed to expand the range of tracking the working links of fraudsters. It is imperative that the cyber-security architecture of the Country be fortified with networking system that will effectively track down the routes of cyber-crime networks driving through the Country across international frontiers. While attention needs to go international, the need to equally develop responsive system to clampdown on the local workings of the enterprise within the domestic entity of Nigeria must be strengthened. It is however more important for the Government to appropriately look into measures of addressing the heightening youth employment with the required socio-economic policies, vibrant enough to give the youth a sense of engagement and responsibility which is important to preoccupy them with productive ventures against delving into illicit enterprises.