As annoying as the endless streams of Nigerian financial scam emails are (and I get a lot myself), imagine how hard your job would be if you were in charge of getting people to take cybersecurity seriously in Nigeria.
Last week, a group of cybersecurity experts in Nigeria met to discuss the current (and apparently pitiful) state of cybersecurity and infrastructure in their country. It's not just the financial scammers destroying their national credibility in the connected world, it's also the lack of available investment in critical infrastructure to ensure their banks and corporations are secure from hackers.
The meeting of the 1st National Conference on Cybercrime and Cybersecurity included the members of the Nigerian ICT community.
"Chris Uwaje, also a Director of Cybersolution in his speech noted that, 'Cybercrime is a serious issue to the nation’s economy', saying that something urgent has to be done to save Nigeria from the impending "Cyber Tsunami". “Cybercrime and cybersecurity are the greatest and, perhaps, most dangerous threat to the development of mankind living on the planet earth today,” he said.
How sad to use the term "tsunami" to describe something completely manmade. We have enough trouble as a society dealing with natural disasters. Let's hope the Nigerian gentleman's overwrought prose doesn't become an accurate metaphor.