Improved collaboration, implementing ESA will save N200 billion from cyber crimes – Valentine Obi

With over 15 million smartphones currently in circulation in Nigeria and with reports by the OEMs to increase this number by making smartphones even more affordable, mobile banking and mobile money adoption in Nigeria has also increased, leading to the need to improve technology resources as well as consider new ways to make the mobile banking easier and safer for consumers.

At the Information Systems Audit and Control Association Conference in Lagos, Mr Valentine Obi, CEO of eTranzact International PLC, talked about how fighting cybercrime and fraud was a collective effort, and that proper coordination among the stakeholders was currently lacking to the advantage of the fraudsters.

He said, “Fighting cybercrime requires the collaboration of the entire ecosystem from the banks, switching companies, to the regulatory bodies. The current strategy to fight cybercrime in Nigeria is not sufficient.

“N127billion is lost every year in Nigeria to cybercrime according to the Minister of Communications, Mr Adebayo Shittu. The payment industry stakeholders need to clearly define the rules of engagement in the event of a fraudulent activity in the industry.

“Information technology risks have evolved dramatically in the last few years but the approach that financial institutions use to manage them has not kept apace. Hard tokens cost as much as N3000 and if a customer with four accounts needs to get a token, that amounts to N12,000 per customer leaving the customer to either get the tokens or be excluded from electronic transactions altogether. We believe this is the age to deploy other cheaper and safer options that are not dependent on hardware.

“eTranzact has started the implementation of Applock – a technology that ties mobile financial service apps with mobile phones to help banks, mobile money operators and other partners reduce fraud and safeguard financial information of customers.

“eTranzact has created an Enhanced Strong Authentication System (ESA) which, in addition to the Applock technology, will significantly help reduce cybercrime and fraud in POS, Mobile and web transactions. With ESA, the mobile phone becomes the token, allowing the user secure multiple bank accounts with one phone.

“ESA will translate to savings of over N120 billion spent on hard tokens for 40 million cards and will result in no foreign exchange loss.  ESA allows the generation of one time password codes and setting dynamic spending limits on ATMs and cards.”

Also on the panel at the conference were Lazarus Ikechukwu, former CTO of Fidelity Bank and Professor Charles Ayo from Covenant University.