Police Launch Cybercrime Reporting Portal, Warn Against Fake Information
The Nigeria Police Force has unveiled a cybercrime reporting web portal, the Force Public Relations Officer, Frank Mba, has announced.
In a statement on Thursday, Mba explained that the portal – which can be accessed via https://incb.police.gov.ng/ – is part of efforts directed at ensuring ease of reportage by members of the public to enable prompt investigation, arrest and prosecution of perpetrators of cybercrime and other related offences.
The portal caters for complaints pertaining to cybercrimes, allowing victims and complainants to report cases online, at any time and from any part of the world.
“The cases are promptly attended to by the Cybercrime Unit of the Force domiciled with the INTERPOL National Central Bureau (NCB), Force Headquarters, Abuja and the newly created Cybercrime Unit at the INTERPOL Annex, Alagbon Close, Ikoyi, Lagos,” said Mba.
He added, “The new portal will provide updates on achievements being recorded by the Nigeria Police and will, among other things, avail the citizens knowledge of basic cyber-related issues such as emerging cybercrime trends, the modus operandi of the cyber crooks and offer tips on how citizens could make themselves less vulnerable within the cyberspace.”
The police, however, asked potential users of the portal to ensure that only correct and accurate information, devoid of deliberate falsehood, misrepresentation and misinformation, were provided when filing their complaints.
Mba disclosed that operatives of the Police Cybercrime Unit, INTERPOL National Central Bureau (NCB), Abuja, have arrested three suspects.
They include Onwuka Chidiebere (also known as Ceeceeboss TMT) who resides at Lekki, Lagos State, as well as Ikechukwu Ohanedozie (Dozzy) and Onuegwu Ifeanyi (SSGToolz) of Prof’s Avenue, Umudagu, in Imo State.
According to the police spokesman, the three suspects were arrested following intelligence report received from INTERPOL Cybercrime Directorate in Singapore, on global attacks by Nigerian cyber gangs who engage in mass email phishing campaigns and distribution of malwares aimed at stealing authentication data from browsers and email headers.
The statement read, “Findings so far reveal that of the three suspects, Onuegwu Ifeanyi a.k.a SSGToolz specialises in creating, designing, selling of phishing links and hosting malware on the website used by the gang for phishing and hacking purposes.
“He collects charges running into several millions of naira from other fraudsters he mentors and improves their phishing capabilities.
“Onwuka Emmanuel Chidiebere a.k.a Ceeceeboss TMT, a graduate of Business Administration from Imo State University specialises in business email compromise and hacking.
“A comprehensive forensic analysis reveals that he had in his laptop-computer over 50,000 email accounts and websites including passwords of various individuals and corporate entities across the world.
“He recruited the third suspect Ikechukwu Ohanedozie a.k.a Dozzy, a medical student of Imo State University, into the gang.
“Ikechukwu Ohanedozie sorts and profiles e-mail accounts to determine the financial strengths of prospective victims and passes on information obtained therefrom to Onwuka Emmanuel Chidiebere.”
Mba stated that the suspects would be charged to court at the conclusion of the police investigation and prosecuted in line with the Cybercrime Prevention/Prohibition Act, 2015.
He added that the Inspector General of Police, Mohammed Adamu, has reaffirmed the commitment of the Force to protecting cyberspace and bringing all cybercriminals to book.
The police gave an assurance of confidentiality of all reports and complaints made through the cyber portal.
