Information Technology Systems and Security Professionals ITSSP, an interest group under Nigerian Computer Society, is set to build community of ethical hackers in Nigeria so as to bridge the abysmal gap between the country and its counterparts.
Prof Adesina Sodiya, president Information Technology Systems and Security Professionals ITSSP, dropped this hint at the maiden edition of the Information Technology Systems and Security Professionals workshop, tagged “Information Security Congress 2017”.
He stated, “We intend to build community of true information security experts, many people in this country are talking about information security, cyber security without providing platforms were people can actually develop their skills and knowledge in this area of information security,
“That is why we still have a very few information security experts in this country and we need to also get there,
“The difference between us and some of these developed countries in the area of information and cyber security is still very wide.
“We have to bridge this gap because people are also saying that the next world war will be fought on the cyberspace and if we don’t develop our knowledge and skills we will not be there.
“That is why we have put this kind of workshop together so that people that are interested in the area of information security can actually develop their knowledge, even if they are going to get to a level where they can further develop themselves in this area”.
He stated that the current participants in this maiden edition were contacted from members of Nigerian computer society and other identified individuals and organizations all over the country.
He added that information security is a specialize area of IT as very few people are interested IT Security.
Prof Sodiya, said that with the news making the round every day of the wave of cyber attack, no organization or system is protected everywhere, “so there is no level of protection you put in place is too minimal”.
Lanre Marcaully, a global cyber-security expert, also reiterated the need for Nigerians to be security conscious whenever they access the internet.
He stated” that internet is still at the early phase in Africa, people still want to consumer the internet, you are on facebook, and you don’t care about security, you are just enjoying it but there are security guys taking your information and data.
“ In this part of the world we are not conscious of security, you are in your church and your are telling people that you just arrived at your church, you take a selfie and you post on Facebook, now you do the same when you are leaving the church,
“What you are actually doing is that you are giving these hackers minute to minute information about yourself, so they can get your data.
“All these are security concerns we have, so first thing that is very critical is that government should create a cyber awareness that will make people to know that the internet is good but they are not safe, so they need to be conscious and protect themselves.
He added that Phishing emails are the common type of cyber attack that every Nigerian receives on a daily basis and he advised that businesses and individuals should brace up, with the advent of smartphones and broadband penetrations they will witness more of these types of attacks.