As part of efforts to fight electronic banking fraud in the country, the Nigeria Electronic Fraud Forum (NeFF) has advised commercial banks to rely on the Cybercrime Prohibition and Prevention Act in punishing offenders.
The Chairman of NeFF, Mr. Dipo Fatokun, made this call while speaking to journalists on the sidelines of the quarterly forum of the group in Lagos at the weekend.
The Act was signed by former President Goodluck Jonathan before leaving office. The new Cybercrime Act, which was signed on May 15, 2015, stipulates that henceforth, any crime or injury on critical national information infrastructure, sales of pre-registered Sim cards, unlawful access to computer systems, Cyber-Terrorism, among others, would be punishable. Among others, the Act also lists offenses and penalties including unlawful access to computers, unlawful operation of cybercafes, system interference, intercepting electronic messages, emails, e-money transfer, tampering with critical infrastructure, and computer-related forgery, among others, as offenses that are punishable under the Act.
To this end, Fatokun, who is the Director, Payment System Department at the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), explained that the objective of the NeFF meeting was to give assurance to the industry that there is currently a legal backing that would assist then in the fight against electronic fraud.He described that Cybercrime Prohibition Act as a strong force that would help the industry in combating electronic fraud.
So many things that were not criminalised in the past, are now criminal offences. And if people are aware of this, it would even serve as a deterrent to those who want to be involved in activities that could send them to prison or deny them of their freedom or even make them to pay heavy fine. So we are gathered here to educate ourselves firstly, and see ways through which we can get these information out to the public to give a warning as far as the electronic payment platform is concerned," he added.
Commenting on efforts by the group in addressing the internal connivance fraudsters get from bank workers, he said: "We have a procedure in place. For example, if anyone is dismissed in a bank because of fraud, the name of such an individual would be sent to the Banking Supervision Department of the CBN, where a database is maintained and such people are blacklisted.
By being blacklisted, it means that such a person cannot work in the banking industry. So, how much does such a person want to gain to spoil his or her reputation and family name? Another thing is that the banks are collaborating to ensure that we reduce electronic fraud.
The challenge we face in electronic payments today are more real than imagined. The NeFF has certainly responded to the challenges of the time by making Nigeria increasingly difficult for cyber criminals."
He also said members of the forum would pay a courtesy visit on the Chief Justice of the Federation. This, according to Fatokun, was in a bid to strengthen the industry's relationship with the judiciary and set the tone for a planned judiciary training to strengthen capacity.
"There is the strong need for the judiciary and law enforcement agencies to corporate with us and it is in our effort to actualise our plan in that regard that this visit to the Chief Justice will be conducted," he added.
The CBN director said NeFF would also remodel its online presence so as to increase awareness in the battle against electronic fraud on Facebook, Twitter and other social media platforms, adding that the forum would soon have a robust website that would assist in the dissemination of information.
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