Africa-Press – Senegal. Cybercrime represents « a real threat for all States, especially for developing countries », warned Thursday in Dakar, the head of the special cybersecurity division of the National Police of Senegal, Aly Kandé.
« Cybercrime is a real threat for all States, especially for developing countries which do not have the means to fight against the scourge », he declared.
Aly Kandé, police commissioner, head of the special cybersecurity division of the national police of Senegal, a subdivision of the judicial police responsible for combating digital offenses, spoke during a panel on cybersecurity organized in the digital week framework
He noted that the theft of computer data accompanied by blackmail and threats to publish sensitive information is the first type of cyberattack recorded in Senegal.
« If you do some research, you will see that some state institutions were victims of this not very long ago. Malicious people had managed to infiltrate the information system of these institutions to download data, and then threaten to publish them for ransoms,” he said.
“The second most prominent cybercrime attack is ramsomware [ransomware, ransomware or extortion software], which are computer attacks that will not steal your data but rather encrypt it, i.e. say make them unusable, » he explained.
Commissioner Aly Kandé reveals that threats of dissemination of personal content account for no less than 35 percent of cybercrime complaints in Senegal.
“To just give you an idea, in 2022 we received over 3,600 complaints of threats to release personal data,” he revealed.
He believes that we must always return to raising awareness by insisting on the danger posed by the use of mobile phones.
« Today, people who take the risk of filming themselves should know that there are several ways for these images to leak. There are people who come to the office to say they had intimate videos in their phones, but they ended up on the net without them sending them to anyone,’ he explained. .
He recommends people to be careful when repairing their mobile phones, computers or devices containing personal data.
« There are also people who are not totally tech-savvy and ask someone to set up a Google account for them. However, if the person is in bad faith or dishonest, he can create an account to which he himself will have access to be able to use the photos and videos that are saved in the account, » he warned.
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