By Clifford Agugoesi, Editor-in-Chief
Globally, there is the realization that journalists are supposed to be strong change agents and evidently, not a few are demonstrating capacity in this regard, by deploying the power of the pen, in shaping and reshaping society, but the Nemo principle, which says ‘you cannot give what you do not have (Nemo dat quod non habet), now makes it compelling that members of the Fourth and Fifth Realms of The Estate(Journalists and bloggers)to learn, relearn and unlearn in order to remain relevant in their trade.
On Friday, December 3, 2021, a cyber-security awareness non governmental organization Cybersafe Foundation in collaboration with the Committee of Chief Information Security Officers of Nigerian Financial Institutions (CCISONFI) pooled experts together and rallied ICT journalists under the auspices of the Nigerian Information Technology Reporters Association(NITRA) to be equipped with adequate knowledge needed for being cybersecurity aware and reporting Cybersecurity trends and issues.
The training which took place at Romey Hall, YCMA Building, Awolowo Road in Ikoyi, Lagos, south west Nigeria under the theme in local parlance ‘NoGoFallMaga’ or ‘DoNotGiveInToCyberthreats’. The training was essentially designed to raise awareness on emerging cyber security trends, hazards of cyber threats and assaults, as well as how to avoid them.
The experts said that cybersecurity threats and attacks are not going away any soon and that the occurrence could snowball into the next pandemic. The experts underscored on the need for collaboration with the media to curb the growing challenge of cyber-security threats in Nigeria.
All of them, in various presentations, shared with participants from their perspectives, various cyber security concerns considered as digital pandemic and how to report these intelligently and at the same time make some good money doing so.
In his opening speech, the CCISONFI chairman, Igboa Abumere noted that awareness is key in combating cyber threats and relevant to complementing existing regulations.
In her presentation titled “Cybersecurity For Journalists And The News Media”, the Group Chief Information Security Officer (GCISO) at Access Bank Plc, Favour Femi- Oyewole who prefers to address journalists as “Cybersecurity Ambassadors”, warned that cyber-attacks would be the next post-COVID pandemic saying that it is critical for businesses and people to begin building resilience and backups for their systems, platforms, and apps. She urged organisations to check their ability to bounce back should they suffer any attack.
“If anything happens to you, how quickly can you bounce back? Have you checked your resilience, do you have a backup”, she asked.
According to Femi-Oyewole, integrity, confidentiality, and availability of a good cybersecurity system must be emplaced by organisations as part of their cybersecurity strategies. Said she : “You need to put necessary measures in place to quickly detect any breaches and remedy. Vulnerability is any flaw or weakness that can be exploited. There should be counter measures in place to prevent, minimize or report any breaches on time so that corrective measures can be taken up immediately”.
On his part, Chief Information and Security Officer (CISO) at GTBank Plc, Bharat Soni in his presentation, “Communicating Cybersecurity & Fraud Incidents Effectively To The General Public” , said organizations should work to mitigate cyber security challenges such as insider fraud, business email compromises, ransomware, and phishing.
Mr. Soni explained that cyber threats and assaults have increased due to technological advancements,
social-economic considerations, and insufficient criminal justice. He listed the most recent cyber security breaches as Twitter compromise 2020, Colonial Ransomware Attack 2021, and Cyber Breach of an Undisclosed Nigerian Bank 2021.
For Soni, social media has become a challenge to reporting cyber incidents as many people do not check the authenticity of news posted on these social media platforms. According to him, this is why media collaboration is critical to cybersecurity awareness.
The Chief Visionary Officer/ Co-Founder at Digital Encode, Dr. Obadare Peter Adewale in his presentation coded “Active Cybersecurity Reporting”, advised ICT journalists to arm themselves with a growth mindset and get equipped with knowledge of trends in the cybersecurity ecosystem and strive to distinguish themselves in their reportage. He advised journalists to seek to have 3-Dimension Competencies listing: Theoretical knowledge, Functional competence and Social competence. A perfect admixture of these competencies, Dr. Obadare said, will take journalists on higher grounds in their practice, enable them naturally create the much needed trust between them and their sources and help them to make money in the process.
Kickstarting Training Session 3, the founder, Cybersafe Foundation, Confidence Staveley in her presentation titled: “Cyber Evangelism advised the newhounds to protect themselves against cyber attacks by following best practices and taking all the necessary precautions before voyaging the vast extent of the internet.
Staveley said that journalists can secure safe passage to their informational channels, without fearing the unexpected infiltration attack.
She also gave a list of tips and pointers to help journalists, anchors, newscasters, and reporters safely focus on their professions such as using strong Passwords; utilizing a VPN; ability to identify phishing, smishing, vishing and other forms of attacks.
Said she: “Authentication is the most important aspect of privacy. Malicious people can do anything they can to get login credentials for important services like bank accounts, social media handles, website subscriptions, and emails.”
Staveley warned that simple and weak passwords are getting incredibly easy to crack for cybercriminals, and since many people use the same passwords for multiple websites, the looming threat only intensifies.
All in all, all the resource persons emphasized the need for people to realize they are the first human firewall against cyberthreats. Taking it further is the point that communication, effective communication, that is, is a countermeasure in managing cybersecurity threats.
About 30 ICT journalists and media entrepreneurs took part in the capacity building training and received certificates at the end of the day.
