Africa: Cybercrime on the Rise as Bandwidth Increases

By Zachary Ochieng

ADDIS ABABA----As Africa celebrates the increased bandwidth following the landing of the submarine cables along its coast, legal and regulatory challenges are also beginning to emerge as cyber criminals take advantage of high Internet connectivity to commit fraud. In her keynote address during the workshop on Legal and Regulatory Frameworks for the Knowledge Economy in Africa, a pre-event to the Second Session of the Committee on Development Information, Science and Technology (CODIST II), Ms Aida Opoku-Mensah, Director, ICT Science and Technology Division, UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), noted that as the information society expands, the challenges of cyber security must be tackled effectively if the growth of e-commerce is to be realised.

“Most African countries still do not have coordinated approaches to dealing with cyber security with the task sometimes left to the private sector. There is need to harmonise cyber security policies for the successful growth of e-commerce and e-signatures on the continent”, Ms Opoku-Mensah observed.

She lauded Ghana and Ethiopia for their efforts to have a cyber policy in place and urged other countries to follow suit.

Ms Cecil Bashe, Economic Affairs Officer, UN Conference on Trade and Development said the workshop provides an opportunity on how best to regulate the information economy. The main challenge, she noted, remains the harmonization of cyber laws.

“Without such legal framework, the potential of ICTs to promote economic growth and development cannot be realised”, she said.

At yet another pre-CODIST event, dubbed Launching the African Inter-Parliamentary Forum on Science, Technology and Innovation, Ms Opoku-Mensah urged the 40 legislators present at the event to bring the scientific community closer to them in order to promote the development of Science and Technology on the continent. She noted that political will is a prerequisite for Science, technology and Innovation to thrive.

CODIST II, to be held in Ethiopia’s capital Addis Ababa under the theme Innovation for Africa’s industrial Development, will be officially opened at 5:00 pm today and runs till Thursday 5th May. It will explore the extent to which African countries have harnessed innovation to enhance industrial development of the continent. A key highlight of the programme will be the Technology in Government in Africa Awards (TIGA), whose winners will be announced this evening at a gala ceremony to be held at the Sheraton Hotel in Addis Ababa.