BY MOTOLANI OSENI
Nigeria has been ranked as a Tier-3 country in the 2024 Global Cybersecurity Index (GCI) released by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU)
The latest report places Nigeria in a mid-tier classification for its efforts in combating cyber threats, improving national cyber resilience, and developing a secure digital environment.
The ITU’s GCI assesses countries based on five key pillars: legal measures, technical capabilities, organizational capacity, capacity building, and cooperation. Launched in 2015 by the ITU, it seeks to help countries identify areas of improvement and encourage countries to act in building capacity and capabilities under each pillar.
Nigeria’s highest score was in legal measures, where the country scored 19.52 out of the 20 marks obtainable. Each country is ranked according to its overall cybersecurity performance across these areas. Tier-3 countries are generally described as those making significant strides but still facing substantial gaps in their cybersecurity frameworks.
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According to ITU, the 194 countries measured are categorized into five tiers. Tier-3 and tier-4 countries are countries that have been expanding digital services and bringing people online but still have work to do to ensure that cybersecurity becomes part of their meaningful connectivity objectives.
Comparatively, Tier-1 and Tier-2 countries have shown a strong commitment to each of the five cybersecurity pillars, whereas Tier-5 countries are falling short in each of the GCI’s five pillars. 105 countries are categorised in tiers three and four of the report, while 46 countries are assigned to Tier 1, the highest of the five levels, which is designated for “role modelling.”
ITU in the GCI 2024 noted that the African region has advanced the most in cybersecurity since 2021.
The least developed countries (LDCs) in the globe have also started making gains, but they still require assistance to go farther and quicker. According to GCI 2024 data, the typical LDC today has the same level of cybersecurity that many developing nations that are not LDCs did in 2021.
Land-locked developing countries (LLDCs) and small island developing states (SIDS) continue to face resource and capacity constraints on cybersecurity efforts, according to the report.
Commenting on the report, ITU secretary-general, Doreen Bogdan-Martin, said, “Building trust in the digital world is paramount. The progress seen in the Global Cybersecurity Index is a sign that we must continue to focus efforts to ensure that everyone, everywhere can safely and securely manage cyber threats in today’s increasingly complex digital landscape.”
Director of ITU’s Telecommunication Development Bureau, Cosmas Luckyson Zavazava, added, “The Global Cybersecurity Index 2024 shows significant improvements by countries that are implementing essential legal measures, plans, capacity building initiatives, and cooperation frameworks, especially in strengthening incident response capabilities.”
The research highlights several worrisome threats, such as ransomware attacks directed at government services and other sectors, cyber breaches that impact key industries, expensive system disruptions, and privacy violations that affect both individuals and organisations.
The ITU claimed that the average cost of a data breach has climbed by 15 percent over the last three years, with over 2 800 documented breaches in 2023 compromising eight billion records. Countries are putting rules on personal data protection, privacy protection, and/or breach notification into effect in order to give people recourse and rights, as well as to set clear standards for organisations managing data.
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