The African Institute of Information Security (AIIS), has called on the Federal Government to formulate policies, laws and regulations that would ensure citizens’ data were secured.
A Cyber Security Analyst, Mr Kayode Eyinade, said this on the sidelines of a two-day workshop on Friday in Abuja.
he workshop on Information Security and Ethical Hacking, was organised by the institute to create awareness to the public.
Yinade, who was one of the facilitators, urged the government to enact laws that would make it possible for fraudsters to be tracked and punished.
“Government needs to create the policy, laws and regulation that will be able to make everybody safe and secured.
“If people commit crime, how do we track them down, how do we punish them to effect deterrent from others who want to do it?
“Those are the necessary steps and you know they say security is a shared responsibility, all of us have particular roles to play.
“We the professionals, the users, the government agencies and corporate organisations have a role to play,” Eyinade said.
He said that the workshop was organised as a result of numerous complaints by individuals of fraudsters hacking into their accounts and defrauding them.
“So many people have been complaining that their Facebook account, yahoo mail and Instagram page are being hijacked and all these bring fear to people.
“People want solution and answers to all these problems because they are scared. So, that is one of the reasons this workshop was put together.
“But first the awareness of the existence of the problem should be created which is the first step and that is why this workshop was organised,” Eyinade said.
He said that one of the effective ways of securing data was by constant change of passwords, combination of alpha numerals, mixture of different cases of alphabets, and symbols.
One of the beneficiaries at the workshop, Mr David Martins, described the workshop as an open avenue to have more knowledge on information technology.
“With the little knowledge that I have acquired, I really need to go further into cyber security.
“I look forward to become certified in information technology.