Concerted efforts needed to fight cybercrime
The Minister for Communications, Mrs Ursula Owusu-Ekuful has called for a concerted effort to fight cybercrime. She explained that cybercrime posed a lot of challenges to the technological development of Ghana.
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Speaking at the opening of a three-day international workshop on criminal justice statistics on cybercrime and electronic evidence in Accra on March last Wednesday, she said “cybercrime is borderless in nature and poses real challenges to all our counties. Its transnational nature requires the concerted efforts of all users of cyberspace in addressing cybercrime and it is dangerous for any country to adopt an attitude of aloofness.”
“Mindful of this,we have welcomed cooperation with the ITU in developing the national CERT and actively collaborating with you all under the auspices of the GLACY+ programme to build our capacity to combat cybercrime. Our participation in this International Workshop on Criminal Justice Statistics on Cybercrime and Electronic Evidence is further evidence of our desire to learn from best practices and enhance our response to the emerging threats we all face,” she said.
She also mentioned the government’s strategic plans to combat e-crime and these included the establishment of a national cyber security council and a cyber-security centre to oversee cyber security incident reporting and the establishment of a forensic laboratory in place to support investigations and prosecutions.
The workshop
The workshop was organised by the Council of Europe which sought to interrogate the current systems available in each member country with regards to reporting, collating and interpreting statistics on Cybercrime and Electronic Evidence and to build capacity to develop measures in this regard.
The workshop brought together many law enforcement and justice professionals involved in collecting, collating and interpreting statistics for offences of cybercrime across the globe including Philippines, Tonga, Sri Lanka, Morocco among others.
A Project Manager at the Council of Europe, Mr Matteo Lucchetti, said in a 2016 assessment of the cybersecurity situation in Ghana, the Council of Europe delegation that conducted the assessments were impressed with the focus and the competencies that were dedicated to addressing cyber-related issues on the national level.
Notable are existing legislations for matters related to cybercrime and proper handling of electronic evidence, a consolidated institutional framework as evidence by the recent National Cybersecurity Strategy and a general high level of awareness of issues concerning cybercrime.
The Head of Governance of the EU Delegation in Ghana, Mrs Maria Luisa Trancoso, stated that the government had a duty to protect citizens from crime and breach of privacy. She acknowledged that one of the biggest challenge in fighting cybercrime was under-reporting of cybercrime and a lack of statistics and data for analysis.
Trend in Cybercrime
The acting Director-General of the NCA, Mr Joe Anokye, who spoke on the potential increase in cybercrime cases, explained that at the end of January 2017, total mobile data subscriptions in Ghana was 20,064,110 with a penetration rate of 70.90 per cent.