The Federal Government has been urged to create employment and an enabling environment for the youth in order to tackle cybercrime, popularly known as yahoo-yahoo.
A security expert and the Managing Director of Beacon Consulting Limited, Kabir Adamu, also called on the government to tackle the high cost of living, and other socio-economic factors that encouraged people to engage in Internet fraud.
Saturday PUNCH had earlier reported that no fewer than 303 internet fraudsters were jailed between September and November 2023.
Adamu said, “The reason the perpetrators go into it is because of the benefits they gain from it. They target vulnerable individuals and corporate organisations.
“The first thing to do tackle is this is to deny them the ability to benefit from the rewards they get from Internet fraud. We need to improve the surveillance carried out on our financial systems. That will allow law enforcement agencies to monitor the proceeds of crime and go after those that benefit from it.
“Also, the government needs to work on the reasons that make people engage in such activities, which are the rate of unemployment and the high cost of living, as well as socio-economic factors, including ensuring that the value system of schooling is worked upon.”
A professor of Constitutional Law at the University of Jos, Nnamdi Aduba, also stressed that idleness, greed, flamboyant display of wealth on social media, and lack of home training were some of the reasons cybercrime had continued to thrive in the country.
He said the government should ensure adequate funding of the education sector to engender the delivery of quality education.
He said, “Yes, the issue of unemployment is contributory, but one of the major issues is the greed element because sometimes, you find out that the people that are duped could have avoided such if they had made enquiries.
“But, if there is quality education, things like that will be minimal. There is a need for the government to fund education, and this idea of increasing school fees will worsen matters.”
