Africa under siege by rising mobile threat —Report

Africa has now been recognised as an important region for growth and investment, particularly as African countries are increasingly a choice target for cybercriminals.

According to a research carried out by leading provider of cyber-security solutions, Check Point Software Technologies, even though the continent’s internet penetration was only 35.2 per cent in December 2017, 19.2 per cent behind the world average, cybercrime is a serious threat to countries in Africa.

The research discovered that one of the main challenges that the security industry in Africa and world over, continuously fight against is mobile security. It’s hardly surprising given that sub-Saharan Africa alone currently has a unique mobile subscriber penetration of 44 per cent, expected to hit 52 per cent in 2025.

“The sheer economy of scale offered by mobile devices is incredibly appealing to cybercriminals. They are using every available opportunity to attack individuals and organisations through their mobile devices, including Apps, particularly because these devices are so popular and people usually do not take strict precautions when it comes to securing them as they would with their laptops for example,” said Mr Rick Rogers, Regional Director, Africa at Check Point.

Check Point, the research stated, has discovered two major vulnerabilities related to mobile devices over the past month alone – Man-in-the-Disk, where their researchers discovered a new attack surface for Android apps exploiting a shortcoming in the way that Android apps use storage resources and FakesApp, where researchers discovered a vulnerability in WhatsApp that allows a threat actor to intercept and manipulate messages sent by those in a group or private conversation.

“It’s no surprise that mobile attacks are having a major impact on organisations in Nigeria. One of the key markets in Africa, Nigeria is quickly becoming a mobile-first country, with mobile penetration increasing from 53 per cent in 2016 to 84 per cent in 2017. And considering the availability of phones is at a lower price point, more Nigerians are now able to afford a mobile device.

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“Even though, major malware like Ransomware, cryptominer and banking trojans have had, and continue to have, a big impact, it is mobile attacks on Nigerian companies that are growing in prevalence. When comparing the impact of these attacks to the global market we find that Nigeria averaged 20 per cent – 35 per cent higher between January and August this year, which is not to be taken lightly,” Rogers stated.

He added that: The current threat landscape has evolved into a much more aggressive beast. We are now experiencing Gen V (5th Generation) cyber-attacks, which are characterised as large-scale and fast moving across multiple industries.

“These sophisticated attacks on mobile, cloud and various enterprise networks, easily bypass conventional defences being used by most organisations today as they rely on older generations of security,”  Rogers observed.

The report further stated that seeing that Africa is increasingly under threat from cybercriminals, the need for local businesses to partner with security specialists that can help them remain one step ahead of the game is essential.