INTERVIEW TECH:Organizations need to deploy right technologies to tackle e-payment fraud – Regha
Onajite Regha is the Executive Secretary and Chief Executive of E-payment Providers Association of Nigeria (E-PPAN). In this interview with Tony Nwakaegho, she spoke on why cybercrime is still in vogue despite the entire advocacy and the way forward. Excerpts:
What is the E-PPAN conference all about?
The conference is an annual series where we look at the payment systems and fraud in the payment systems and this is the 7th edition in the series. The conference is designed as a veritable rallying ground for all stakeholders in all electronic payment value chain to deliberate on payments systems and fraud knowledge.
The objectives of this year’s conference are to address the challenges posed by people’s laxity in divulging and compromising organization information system to fraudsters; re-appraise, reconnect and tackle the processes that compromise the entire system of e-payment hemisphere in Nigeria, and fashion out how organizations can invest in and deploy the right technologies to enable the industry be a step ahead of criminals.
Why is it that fraud is still on the increase despite the entire advocacy being in vogue?
It is not a surprise that fraud is on the increase and it is not a misnomer, it is very normal that fraud will be on the increase because it is a business of criminals, as criminals will always follow the money wherever the money goes. So, no matter what you do, you should be rest assured that it is somebody’s business to try to defraud the system. What we try to do is to make sure that any way they come we try to block it. I can assure you that we will get creative and come in all the ways to try to block them. So what you can find is that an old technique may fade away and new technique will come, but fraud will certainly be there. Payment fraud will certainly be there because crime is some people’s business.
Have the efforts you put in so far translated to the grass root where we have the SMEs?
Certainly, every improvement in the system affects all stakeholders whether grass root, whether top of the pyramid, anything that impacts or affects the reduction of payment fraud, it will affect everybody. Yes it translates to the grass root. But the truth is when new techniques come out unfortunately the people at the bottom of the pyramid, not really the bottom of the pyramid, the people who do not understand; who are not financially literate may be the first victim but after that really they learn their lesson and then we move on. It translates to the grass root and sometimes you will see that they are more vulnerable. Most of the people in that region are not literate and so maybe you are even doing some advocacy work they may not be able to catch the message quickly as the elites will catch the message. But fraud cuts across the whole spectrum of the society.
Do we have formidable institutions that take care of these electronic frauds issue that are now prevalent in the society?
Yes, E-PPAN is doing a lot when it comes to advocacy, literacy creation. We also have the Nigerian Electronic Fraud Forum which is the highest body for electronic fraud management in Nigeria. What we do in that forum is that the stakeholders in the industry meet regularly to share trends, to forecast where the crime is coming from and to put in place measures to match the criminals in their business, and to checkmate them. And then the industry stakeholders have started working more together and we find that every different unit in the industry like an industry body, for instance we have all the banking heads, investigative heads, and chief compliance officers coming together. That results to better collaboration within the industry.
How do you manage ‘Insiders’ instigated system breaches within the banking sector?
That relies heavily on the processes you put in place, but it is not enough for you to put the process in place. It is not enough for you as an organization to ensure that the processes you put in place are working. So you test it, throw it open, you test it and then you don’t just put it for the like of it, you continue to review, to check and ensure that those processes you put in place are still relevant. You then ensure that your people understand why you put a process in place. Because, if you put it there and they don’t know why; it’s as good as not having it.
How do you now grow the knowledge of cyber threats in schools, NGOs and religious institutions?
The only way to grow it is by advocacy, awareness creation. People have to know, and this fraud conference is part of it. Even though this fraud conference we are looking inward there is a lot of sensitive information being divulge here. So we actually look inward, but it is part of it and at the end of the day whatever the findings are, we send it out the right people. We have magazines that we disseminate outside of the stakeholders in the industry to users. You find out that a lot of people don’t know, but if you give them information, you find out that it help them to become better. If one person knows and passes all the information to 10 people in his family, and those other 10 pass the information to another 10, you find out that there are 100 people already informed.
What has been the impact of your entire advocacy on the people in market places and so on?
I am sure a lot of people are aware of the tricks of the fraudsters. It is the impact of the advocacy and awareness creation. As I said earlier, the criminals will always change their tactics. So when they change their tactics we also find out a way to send the message out there to the people. You would find out that the crime is not always the same thing as they change their tactics. It shows that the advocacy and the awareness are working against them, so they need to consistently change what they are doing.
These fraudsters who are often arrested are found walking freely on the streets. What is E-PPAN doing in order to collaborate with the judiciary to halt the sophistication of cybercrime?
For the past three years now, the judiciary has always been a part of this our conference. It means that we are enlightening them. Last month, we did training for them under the CIBN (Chartered Institute of Bankers of Nigeria) platform and we had a session to make them understand what electronic payment, and electronic payment fraud is all about. What we are trying to do is to educate them to know better what we are doing.
