Skip to main content

Nigerian Minister, Northern Governor Visit Egypt To Aquire Security Platform For Monitoring People's Calls

By

 


A Nigerian minister and a governor of a northern state recently visited Egypt to get security platforms to monitor people's calls, text messages and other forms of communication.

According to a security source, the minister and governor made a quick trip to the North African in a bid to find technological ways to trample on people's freedom of speech. 

The governor and the minister are both controversial and have also been in the news lately for the wrong reasons. 

"A minister and a governor went to Egypt this week to get a security platform for monitoring calls of citizens. It was a really quick trip," the source said.

The clampdown on free speech in Nigeria has become heightened under the President Muhammadu Buhari administration.

Towards the end of 2015, a Petition Bill targeting online and print media as well as regulating social media posts was sponsored in the Senate but it was followed by a public backlash. 

In 2019, lawmakers introduced the National Commission for the Prohibition of Hate Speech bill and the Protection from Internet Falsehood and Manipulation and other Related Offences bill.

These bills also attracted public critism.

Similarly, conversations about a Nigerian firewall were started during EndSARS protests last year. It was gathered that the EndSARS protests in 2020 made the government more desperate to control the cyberspace. 

In a December 2020 report, University of Toronto’s Citizen Lab, noted that the Nigeria’s Defence Intelligence Agency had acquired equipment that it can use to spy on its citizens’ calls and text messages.

University of Toronto’s Citizen Lab researches on digital surveillance, security, privacy and accountability.

The report, titled Running in Circles: Uncovering the Clients of Cyber-espionage Firm Circles, said a telecom surveillance company by the name of Circles has been helping state security apparatuses across 25 countries, including Nigeria, to spy on the communications of opposition figures, journalists, and protesters.

 

Labels:

Comments

  1. AnonymousJune 13, 2021 at 10:28 AM

    When you are not delivering good governance to the people, you resort to monitoring people's calls.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

EndSARS: Protesters In New York Want SARS Operatives Sacked

By
 Hundreds of young anti-SARS protesters on Sunday stormed the Nigeria House in New York demanding transparency in the disbandment of the police unit back home. The protesters said operatives of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad found wanting should be sacked and not redeployed. Among them was Stephen “Papi” Ojo, the artist, model, and choreographer who stole the show as the ‘blue-guy’ in Beyoncé’s “Already” music video. The protest started shortly after the Inspector-General of Police, Mohammed Adamu, announced the dissolution of the Federal Special Anti-Robbery Squad. Adamu also announced plans for a new arrangement to address anticipated policing gaps following the disbandment, and the constitution of an investigative team to probe the alleged cases of rights violations, among others. But the protesters, who bore placards with different inscriptions including, “We no want audio ban”, said they were not buying it. They argued that previous commitments announced by the force to change...
Post a Comment
Read more

Biden Announces Purchase Of 200M Vaccine Doses

By
  President Joe Biden announced a series of measures on Tuesday aimed at ramping up coronavirus vaccine allocation and distribution, including the purchase of 200 million more vaccine doses and increased distribution to states by millions of doses next week. With those additional doses, Biden said there would be enough to fully vaccinate 300 million Americans -- nearly the entire US population -- by the end of summer or early fall. He described efforts to combat Covid-19 as a "wartime undertaking." We now have a national strategy to beat Covid-19. It's comprehensive. It's based on science, not politics. It's based on truth, not denial, and it is detailed," he said. As part of the new efforts announced Tuesday, the US will buy 100 million more doses from Pfizer/BioNTech and 100 million more from Moderna -- the two-dose vaccines that have been granted emergency use authorization by the US Food and Drug Administration. Pfizer and Moderna are working to step up p...
Post a Comment
Read more

Police Panel Submits ‘Damning Report’ On Disgraced DCP, Abba Kyari

By
The  Special Investigation Panel set up by the Inspector-General of Police, Usman Baba, to probe the former Head, Intelligence Response Team, Abba Kyari, a suspended Deputy Commissioner of Police, has submitted its report. The four-man panel headed by the Deputy Inspector-General of Police in charge of the Force Criminal Investigations Department, Joseph Egbunike, submitted its findings to the IG on Monday. Information from a reliable source states that the panel submitted ‘damning findings’ in its report, although the DCP continued to prove innocence in the face of the accusations.  The source had yet to reveal further details of the report. The United States Attorney’s Office, Central District of California, had issued an arrest warrant against Kyari for his alleged links to the suspected fraudster, Ramon Olorunwa Abbas, alias Hushpuppi, who is standing trial for various offences that include internet fraud and money laundering. Hushpuppi has since pleaded guilty to the char...
1 comment
Read more