An Information Security Strategist, Mr. Harrison Nnaji, said cybercrime could cost the global economy 10 trillion dollars by 2025.
Nnaji, who is the Chief Information Security Officer at First Bank of Nigeria Ltd., said this at a Cybersecurity Webinar on the topic, “Impact of Ukraine and Russia’s War on Cyberspace,” organized by the bank on Wednesday.
He said cybercrime had become a global challenge, coming behind extreme weather, natural disaster, and infectious diseases (COVID-19), hence Nigeria and its citizens must pay more attention to it.
“In terms of losses, last year alone, about six trillion dollars were lost to cybercrimes and this has continued to top the agenda of most Chief Executive Officers. So, this is why we need to pay more attention to it.”
“If we are not paying attention to something that can cost the world six trillion dollars a year, with the capacity to grow to ten trillion dollars by 2025, we should be ready to see a bit of hell,” he said.
He called for more awareness for people to take extra caution to defend themselves from cyberattacks as the issue was complex.
Dr. Muktar Bello, Head Quality Control and Assurance, Forensics Department, EFCC, who spoke on “Social Engineering and Ransomware attack- Impact on the Nigerian Financial System,” urged financial institutions to heighten their security operations to prevent attacks.
According to him, there are lots of risks associated with ransomware.
“So, there is the need for banks to have 24/7 security operations, and like I always advise, the weakest link is always the insider. It’s very important that they heighten their security operations as it will cost victims over 263 billion dollars annually by 2031.”
“As of now, ransomware attacks are happening every eleven seconds, but there has been more government involvement since 2021,” he said.
According to him, the Nigerian government has set up policies to tackle ransomware, a type of malware that threatens to destroy or withhold a victim’s critical data unless a ransom is paid to the attacker.
Mr. Shola Akinnukawe, Head, Electronic Business and Operations Control, First Bank, speaking on “E-Channel Frauds: Sample, Pattern, and Prevention Guidelines,” said the bank had continued to deploy digital platforms to the benefit of the customers.
However, he said as these digital channels increased, fraud had also increased as fraudsters had also migrated from the usual way of defrauding people to the digital channels.
He noted that some common fraud techniques used by fraudsters were: social engineering, card theft, lack of 2FA, PIN compromise, robbery, false assistance, missing/card loss, and internal collusion.
He also said the most vulnerable channels utilized by fraudsters were: web, mobile, ATM, POS, and internet banking.
He urged customers to protect and guard their banking information and pin.
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