Cyberfraud: Nigeria’s Bank Customers Lose N3.6bn in Two Years

• Cyberfraud: Nigeria’s Bank Customers Lose N3.6bn in Two Years

Nigeria’s bank customers lost a total of N3.6 billion to cyberfraud in two years, the Nigeria Electronic Fraud Forum has stated.

Sam Okojere, the Chairman of NeFF, who also doubles as the Director, Payments System Management Department, Central Bank of Nigeria, disclosed this during NeFF’s 2018 annual report on, ‘Emerging fraud threats: An evaluation of the industry cybersecurity posture’ in Lagos.

Okojere said, “In the latest Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System fraud landscape report, it was reported that an actual loss of N2bn was suffered by the industry in 2018 compared to N1.6bn in the preceding year.

“The volume also increased to 38,852 from 25,043 reported in 2017. Of these figures, the mobile channel recorded the highest volume and value, with an estimate of 11,492 in volume and N598.8m in actual loss value, calling for concerted efforts by all stakeholders to tame future escalation.”

According to him, improved growth in the Nigerian payment system would naturally be accompanied by corresponding growth and sophistication in cyberfraud.

However, the approach adopted by regulators and operators will play a crucial factor in combating such threats going forward.

He said, “There had been ongoing negotiations with the telecommunications industry aimed at taming SIM swap fraud in the country, and the negotiations have reached an advanced stage. The partnership with the telcos is increasingly becoming important considering the behaviour of fraud attempts and losses in the country.”

A data released by the NIBSS showed attempted fruad in 2018 alone was valued at about N9 billion.

The NIBSS stated, “The ATM channel recorded the second actual loss fraud value. In spite of this remarkable increase in reported fraud volume this year, its actual loss increased by 25.7 per cent in value when compared to last year.”