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New Horizons Opens N100m IT Centre @ Landmark University

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New Horizons Nigeria, the leading private owned information technology (IT) training institute has opened an international IT resource centre valued at over N100 million at Landmark University, Omu-Aran, near Ilorin in Kwara State at the weekend.

The centre will empower students of the institution with the most sought after IT skills and professional certifications.

The IT resource centre comprises of  two lecture halls, contains 150 state-of-the-art compact desktop computers, projectors,  software for labs practice , over 5 000 textbooks covering several IT  and e- businesses courses, etc.

Professor Yemi Nathaniel, Pro Chancellor of Landmark University, who commissioned the IT resource centre alongside the vice chancellor, Professor Mathew Ajayi; the acting registrar, Dr. Mrs. Rachael Adebayo and many other prefessors, academic and non-academic staff and students enjoined the students to avail themselves of the opportunities that new Horizons brings to their future.

The vice chancellor who welcomed the New Horizons team led by Mr. Tim Akano, its managing director said the journey to actualize the project began four years ago.

“I want to specially commend the New Horizons team for their tenacity and for not giving up even when things seems not to be going the way they were expecting. I know the impact New Horizons is making Covenant University has been wonderful. “That is why when I resumed here I stated that certified IT professional courses must be part of our curriculum.

“I want our students to take maximum advantage of the opportunities available at the IT resource centre. I believe even if you are studying History with the skills and certification programmes offered by the New Horizons/Landmark University you can work anywhere in the world including the oil industry.” He said the role IT plays higher institutions like Landmark University cannot be overemphasized.

 Prof Ajayi said right from inception, the school invested millions of naira in ICT connecting the school’s classrooms, lecture halls, halls of residence and offices with fibre optic cables to provide high speed internet to aid instructions. “Every organisation is seeking competitive advantage; I believe with this partnership with New Horizons, we are in for a good time.  We are blessed to have New Horizons.

Akano in his brief speech spoke on how the ICT world is being controlled by young innovators who have founded companies like Google, Facebook, WhatsApp etc.

He urged the students to empower themselves with IT professional certifications to be relevant in today’s world. . “You can be self-employed after graduation. You can create your own companies and become employers of labour. Some days ago, Facebook acquired WhatsApp, a messaging company founded by two young people for $19bn, that is  about 40 per cent of Nigeria’s GDP.”

“Few months ago, Apple Inc. bought a mapping company owned by  a young Nigerian by name Chinedu for $1billion. Google also bought a company called WAZE  for $1bn. You can begin to do similar innovations by dreaming big” he said. Akano to the elation of the university said he was at Hebrew University, Israel few weeks ago and held discussions on how they can enhance Nigerian higher institutions competencies in agriculture technologies.

He has also held discussion with the Israeli ambassador to Nigeria who has promised to come and deliver a lecture at Landmark University the same topic. He added that New Horizons is committed to improving the skills of the students and lecturers alike.

The pro chancellor on his part enjoined the students to make best use of the opportunities available from the partnership urging the students to go out and make names for themselves and the country.

New Horizons is a leading IT training institution globally with 300 world-class IT training and education centres in 80 countries on six continents. New Horizons courses are based on leading IT technologies and are tailored to position graduates for global competitiveness.

 


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E-Business

Experts Report More than Two Critical Cyber Incidents per day in 2023

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The frequency of high-severity incidents with direct human involvement exceeded two per day in 2023, according to the Kaspersky Managed Detection and Response (MDR) team.

In the latest MDR Analyst Report, they observed this trend across all industries with financial, IT, government, and industrial sectors at the top of the list.

The annual Managed Detection and Response (MDR) Analyst Report provides information about the reported incidents, their nature, and their distribution by industry and geographic region.

It also highlights the most common tactics, techniques and tools attackers used in the past year. These results are based on analysis of MDR incidents detected by the Kaspersky Security Operations Center (SOC).

According to the report, 22.9% of all detected high-severity incidents were recorded in the government sector. IT companies came second (15.4%), closely followed by financial and industrial companies that reported 14.9% and 11.8% of incidents, respectively.

Regarding the nature of these incidents, nearly 25% of them were driven by humans. Just over 20% involved various types of ‘cyber exercises’, which had been previously classified by Kaspersky as targeted attacks but designated as ‘cyber exercises’ upon explicit confirmation by the customer.

The percentage of malware attacks resulting in serious consequences dipped slightly in 2023 compared to previous years, accounting for just over 12% of the total reported critical incidents.

This decline represents the smallest share of high severity incidents in recent years and can be attributed to the “commoditization of attacks”.

This trend reflects the widespread adoption of previously developed tools, originally designed for conducting targeted campaigns which, due to deliberate or accidental leaks, have become common. These tools are now being repurposed in attempts to implement fully automated attack scenarios.

The 2023 MDR’s report, also found that the proportion of incidents involving the detection of targeted attack artefacts, publicly available critical vulnerabilities and the use of social engineering was around 4-5%.

“In 2023, Kaspersky detected a smaller number of high-severity incidents, but observed a simultaneous increase in the number of medium and low severity ones. This redistribution of occurrences is associated with the detection of malware without visible traces of active human participation in attacks, which can be explained by the “commoditization of tools”.

However, it’s important to understand that the low number of high-severity incidents does not necessarily indicate low damage. Targeted attacks are now planned more carefull, and become more dangerous.

Therefore, we recommend the use of effective automated cybersecurity solutions managed with the help of experienced SOC analysts,” comments Sergey Soldatov, Head of Security Operations Center at Kaspersky.

To enhance protection against advanced attacks, companies are advised to implement effective cybersecurity solutions and hire qualified practitioners to manage them or adopt managed security services such as Managed Detection and Response (MDR) and Incident Response.

These products cover the entire incident management cycle from threat identification to continuous protection and remediation. These services will help protect against evasive cyberattacks, investigate incidents and provide additional expertise even if a company lacks security workers.

 


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NDPC Partners Gates Foundation, KPMG on Open Banking Frameworks

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Nigeria Data Protection Commission (NDPC), in partnership with Bill Gates and Melinda Foundation and KPMG are developing open banking frameworks in a move to deepen financial inclusion.

NDPC Partners Gates Foundation, KPMG on Open Banking Frameworks

L-r:; Anna Wallace, Senior Programme Officer for Regulatory and Consumer Protection Technologies at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation,; Dr. Vincent Olatunji , national commissioner of the NDPC; and John Anyanwu, KPMG Head of Cybersecurity and Privacy,

This was the focus of discussion when Dr. Vincent Olatunji , national commissioner of the NDPC, received Anna Wallace, Senior Programme Officer for Regulatory and Consumer Protection Technologies at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and John Anyanwu, KPMG Head of Cybersecurity and Privacy, in Abuja.

The commission revealed in a statement on X (formerly Twitter) that the purpose of the meeting was to discuss open banking frameworks for Nigeria, a project coordinated by the Gates Foundation.

Open banking refers to the practice of providing third-party financial service providers with access to bank account information, transaction data, and other financial data through the use of application programming interfaces.

The meeting served as a pivotal step in recognising NDPC’s crucial role in the project, formalising engagement to ensure robust input in the areas of data protection and privacy.

NDPC emphasised the crucial role of digital identity in the financial sector as well as open banking, stressing the importance of implementing measures to safeguard digital identities to foster trust and confidence

Dr. Olatunji also addressed challenges posed by digital lending companies regarding transparency in data processing activities.

The NDPC Boss noted that the Commission was already working with other stakeholders to tackle the challenges.

He highlighted the misconception among some banks regarding the roles of a Chief Information Security Officer and a Data Protection Officer, emphasising the legal requirement for all data controllers to have a Data Protection Officer.

 

 

 


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32m Attacks Thwarted on World Password Day

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Passwords serve as the foundation of our digital lives, but they also serve as the gateway for cybercriminals to hack into sensitive personal information. Considering their essential function, passwords remain a prime target for increasingly sophisticated cybercriminal attacks.

Therefore, taking proactive measures to safeguard accounts and personal information is imperative.

To mark World Password Day on May 2nd – highlighting the essential role passwords play in protecting our lives online – Kaspersky experts are providing essential tips to enhance password security, ensuring that users data stays out of the hands of attackers.

Weak and simple passwords have always been an attractive target for scammers as cracking them gives criminals access to multiple types of data – personal data, financial information, medical records etc.

Kaspersky telemetry indicates more than 32 million attempts to attack users with password stealers took place in 2023, this followed more than 40 million incursions in 2022.

These alarming statistics highlight the need for users to create strong, unique and varied passwords for different accounts. This way they can mitigate the risks of cyber threats and maintain personal security online.

To enhance password security, Kaspersky experts recommend the following steps and practices:

The ‘association method’ helps create strong and memorable passwords

The association approach involves creating a password from a sequence of words or ideas that have personal significance but are not easily guessable by others. A password can be based on a favourite quote, a memorable song lyric, or a unique combination of objects. This technique generates strong passwords without requiring complex memorisation, helping to maintain security while reducing the risk of forgetting. For example, a phrase “I first visited Paris in 2008” could be transformed into a password “IfvPin2o:o8”.

Are regular passwords too boring? How about emoji?

If using the same password everywhere becomes too much and you lack the imagination to make up something new, emoji-passwords could be a non-standard and safe option. Since they are a part of the Unicode standard, it is potentially possible to use them as passwords.

One of the most significant pros is that scammers cannot brute-force emoji-passwords, since various tools and dictionaries can’t crack combinations like these. More detailed information on how to set up an emoji password and the necessary requirements is available here.

The most obvious option is not the safest one

Using common passwords or default values such as “1234”, “password” or “admin” could make personal data and accounts vulnerable to scammers, since they use automated tools to guess the correct combinations.

It may take several seconds to find the right answer and gain access to personal data. A strong and complicated password includes a mix of letters, numbers, and symbols, while avoiding personal information such as names or birthdays.

Additionally, there are online public free services that allow everyone check how strong their passwords are to mitigate possible risks.

Old, but gold: one account – one password

This practice ensures that if one account is compromised, others remain secure. By creating a unique password for each account, you minimise the damage a hacker can do if they manage to steal one.

This approach isolates security breaches and helps protect sensitive data. According to a global survey, the average user has approximately 8 accounts. Remembering even 2-3 long and complicated passwords (containing up to 15 symbols) could be impossible for the majority of users.

In this case it is both safe and useful to shift the responsibility of remembering all the passwords to a security solution, such as Kaspersky Password Manager.


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