Public, Private Sector to Team up to Fight Cybercrime

Players in the public and private sector have called for concerted efforts in the fight against cybercrimes to develop a conducive online space. This was highlighted during a cyber-security event organized by the Kenya School of Government in partnership with Pan-African cyber-security firm, Serianu.

Speaking at the event which was held on Thursday, Head of National Cyber Command Centre (NC4) Colonel Evans Ombati said cybercriminals are a few common individuals, and there was need to team up and stop them in their tracks.

“We are in a dynamic environment both how we do things and the security issues but the bottom line is actors are the same. I emphasise that whether through phishing, fraud, impersonation that is malicious. In my quest to look for a stable and peaceful environment in cyber space and the physical world we must eradicate cyber-crimes perpetrators,” said Col. Ombati.

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At least 200 people attended the webinar cyber security symposium, where they learned about changing cyber security threats, how to create an enabling environment for critical infrastructure security, how to develop cyber resilience skills, and how to build human capacity for cyber security.

Col. Ombati said that current tech innovations had made it possible to track the criminals through their communication. Col. Ombati said they had employed modern cyber-security infrastructure to curb cybercrime.

“We are trying to bring on measures like detection capability at all points of control. With this, we shall have statistics that will be available to Kenyans and they will be authenticated,” he said.

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He added that the institution would team up with other Kenyan universities to address challenges such as the sim-swap menace that has been rocking the country.

“In our strategic plan, we want to spearhead an engagement where universities can be tasked to address various challenges on cyber security,” he said.

The most common cyber crimes in the country, according to the moderators, are sim swap, social engineering attacks that include duping online users to give out sensitive information, stealing of individuals’ card bank identity numbers, and phishing.

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The NC4 boss said that Kenyans had lost faith in the penal system as punitive measures in the computer misuse and cybercrimes act were lenient for individuals found guilty of money-laundering crimes. He urged Kenyans to stop relying on global cybersecurity measures as they could sometimes be misleading.

Information Communication Authority (ICT) Deputy Director in charge of Information Security Philip Irode said it was important for all public servants to be inducted on cyber security.

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