One of the most recent government institutions in Nigeria that suffered hacking is the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Its website- www.mfa.gov.ng, was hacked and hijacked by hackers using the name “Pakistan Cyber Eaglez.” The website is now functional.
Hackers don’t discriminate on the grounds of social class or region as people around the world have continued to fall victim of this cyber crime. On March 12, An anonymous hacker published the personal and financial information of top ranking United States government officials, prominent stars and politicians, including the wife of the US President, Michelle Obama, and Vice President, Joe Biden.
The increase in the frequency and the amount of damage caused by security breaches bring to the fore the need for more effective information security practices. It also underscores the importance of ethical hackers in stemming the emerging threats in the information technology world.
Ethical hackers are certified IT professionals that look for the weaknesses and vulnerabilities in target systems and use the same knowledge and tools to defend people or an organisation’s data and data infrastructure from malicious exploits and breaches.
Investigations by our correspondent revealed that there is a dearth of ethical hackers compared to other information technology professionals in the country. Besides, training for ethical hacking is not readily available in the country as fewer IT education providers offer courses on it.
Findings revealed that many individuals who wish to build an IT career in ethical hacking either end up taking computer security courses like Security+, CISSP (Certified Information Systems Security Professional ), among others.
Besides, IT-savvy individuals bent on advancing their career in the field have been forced to embark on self-study and practice by laying their hands on course-ware before sitting for the professional certification provided by the International Council of E-Commerce Consultants (EC-Council), headquartered in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Further findings revealed that many IT training institutes do not either introduce ethical hacking courses into their pool of programmes or stopped offering ethical hacking courses. For example, at NIIT, one of the country’s leading IT education provider, ethical hacking courses were cancelled some years back.
The Centre Manager, NIIT Gbagada Centre, Mrs. Onyia Anita, said the institute stopped a major ethical course for interested members of the public some four years ago and only offers ethical courses to IT professionals on corporate sponsorships.
She says, “We don’t offer ethical courses anymore. We used to offer course on hacking techniques but we stopped this some four years ago when this issue of ‘yahoo yahoo boys’ became rampant. We found out that many people, after acquiring this knowledge, use it for dubious and fraudulent purposes and we don’t want our name to be dragged in the mud.
“Many people have been coming since then to make enquiry about it but we advise them to take other courses in computer security. However, there are arrangements for IT members of staff coming from reputable companies to be trained in this field.”
It was further gathered that the few institutions that offer training in ethical hacking make their students enter compulsory legal contracts to ensure that the knowledge acquired will be used for the public good and the knowledge will not be shared with third parties.
Speaking in this light, Head of Operations, GNT Nigeria, an IT training institute, Olorunfemi Lawore, says ethical hacking students must be bound by such legal contracts known as Non Disclosure Agreement.
He adds that though IT institutes that have a name to protect make their student enter into this agreement, others more concerned with money and due to inexperience and the quest for gain do not emphasise it.
He says, “At GNT Nigeria, before a student starts the ethical hacking course, he/she must first have IT network knowledge and must also have gone through a security fundamentals course such as CompTIA Security+.
“But most importantly, is the fact that the students are required to sign the ethical hacking course non-disclosure agreement before the class starts. The non-disclosure agreement is what makes the class ethical and you can then be sure you are not sending out menaces to the society.”
Lawore says the rarity of institutions offering courses on ethical hacking is because of the shortage of certified personnel in the field in the country, adding that such professionals are also expensive to employ as trainers.
For a first class training in the ethical hacking, Lawore says, IT institutions require fully functional labs (virtual or physical) requiring technical know-how which, according to him, are rare to find in Nigeria.
“Also required is the tool-set (over 5,000 tools) and official training materials and course-wares which could be expensive to get and are restricted to certified personnel,” he adds.
Apart from hacking, he itemized threats such as viruses,
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