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By Johnson Obi Lagos
The coronavirus pandemic ravaging the world, which led to a lockdown and closure of business has caused countries to make new work regulations. Many organizations, governments and schools have turned to vital meetings to carry out work activities. This has seen a growing popularity in technology applications such as Zoom, Microsoft Team, Mixlr, Facebook Messenger and Skype.
However there is a growing concern on Government virtual meetings carried out in the Country as the Nigerian cyberspace is considered not safe and unless it is adequately protected it risk been breached by cyber criminals.
Several key Government meetings have been held virtually such as the Federal Executive Council (FEC) chaired by President Muhammadu Buhari, and other activities such as Church services, business conferences, classroom lectures and test have also been carried out on Zoom. Breaches and cyber crime are expected to increase as more people work from the comfort of their homes.
According to The Guardian, The Federal Government uses Microsoft Teams which is more secured than free conferencing apps like zoom.
To urgently curb possible impact, the Mobile Software Solution boss recommended the building of secure national gateways, empowering of data centres to host locally, applying Edge Computing and migrating all national ICT Infrastructure from IPv4 to Internet Protocol Version 6 (IPv6) within the next 18 months.
In 2018, according to the Nigeria Cybersecurity Report, about $800 million disappeared in 2018. Earlier this year, the Chartered Institute of Forensic and Investigative Professionals of Nigeria (CIFIPN) revealed that in the last 10 years, N5.5 trillion was lost to corruption, fraud and cyber crimes.
Nigerians have been advised to avoid using free conferencing apps with limited security tips and use platforms such as Microsoft Teams which is highly secure. Also routine data backup and change of router password is highly recommended.