Cybercrime Act to Protect N6.4tr Telecom Investments, Regulates Cafés

The fight against cybercrimes and telecoms infrastructure vandalism received fresh impetus on May 15, 2015 when Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, erstwhile president of Nigeria, signed into law, the Cybercrimes Act 2015.

The Act has been highly coveted in the nation’s telecommunications sector as a step in securing the $40billion (about NGN6.4 trillion) according to Nigeria’s Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE) statistics in the third quarter 2014.

Specifically, from the commencement of the Act, all operators of cybercafé are expected to register as a business concern with Computer Professionals Registration Council in addition to a business name registration with the Corporate Affairs Commission, among other requirements.

The Cybercrime Act prescribes, 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 will be punishable by this Act.

Benjamin Dikki, director-general of BPE, then said that the deregulation of the country’s telecoms sector coupled with the participation of MTN, Glo, Airtel, Etisalat and Visafone are some of the country’s achievements in the sector.

“The sector now employs over One million Nigerians and has attracted over $40 billion in investments”, he said. ”

The Nigeria Communications Commission (NCC) factsheets show the number of internet users in Nigeria has grown to 83.3million as at February 2015.

Furthermore, the number of active mobile subscribers increased to 145.5million, giving Nigeria a teledensity of over 85% based on a population figure of 170million

Even the NCC expressed delight with various clauses of the new Act.

Mr. Tony Ojobo, director, Public Affairs, Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) as quoted in a document obtained by Nigeria CommunicationsWeek recently, extolled the National Assembly for the bill, which went through the rigorous process before it was passed into an Act.

The Act lists offences and penalties including unlawful access to computers, unlawful operation of cybercafes, system interference, intercepting electronic messages, emails, e-money transfer, tampering with critical infrastructure, Computer-related forgery are punishable under the Act.

It also outlaws theft of electronic devices, electronic signature, child pornography and related offences, racism and xenophobic offences.

Essentially, under the Part II:- Protection Of Critical National Information Infrastructure, the Act entails “the President may, on the recommendation of the National Security Adviser, by Order published in the Federal Gazette, designate certain computer systems or networks, whether physical or virtual, the computer programs, computer data or traffic data vital to this country that incapacity or destruction of or interference with such systems and assets would have a debilitating impact on security, national or economic security, national public health and safety or any combination of those matters as constituting Critical National Information Infrastructure,” among other provisions under the Part II.

Interestingly, this part of the Act serves as a leeway to overcoming the challenges of telecommunications infrastructure vandalism.

Ojobo had while responding to subscribers’ inquests, during a radio phone-in programme, on persistent poor quality of service, affirmed that: There is no gain-saying that the infrastructure is not adequate enough to cope with the level of demand and the forces behind that, we all know. However as continuous investment on infrastructure, deployed and protected, we are going to begin to have reduction on some of these situations”.

Also, cybercafés are expected to “register as a business concern with Computer Professionals Registration Council in addition to a business name registration with the Corporate Affairs Commission and maintain a register of users through a sign-in register and the register shall be available to law enforcement personnel whenever needed”.

The Act contained stiffer penalty for any person who perpetrates electronic or online fraud using a cyber café; Such offender is liable on conviction to imprisonment for a term of 3 years a fine of N1,000,000.00 or both.

For the sheer reason of persistent attach on their towers and cost of maintenance, Etisalat Nigeria was the first to announce the sale of 2,136 of its towers, while MTN Nigeria followed suit with an agreement in principle with HIS for transfer and management of its 9,151 towers.