E-Business
B2B e-commerce: Connecting the Digital Brick and Mortar Divide
The entry of e-commerce in Nigeria was predicated on the coming of an easier, faster and more convenient shopping option to the prevalent brick and mortar culture.
It came with cost saving benefits and a competitive market pricing which gives consumers assortments to choose from. Within a few months, a new price checking culture had emerged.
Nigerians began to check and compare product prices online, rather than the conventional market price sampling. Hence, a rivalry was born, as proponents of digital products gradually lured customers away from physical stores.
While millions of digital natives and migrants tilted towards convenience of online shopping, the Nigerian informal retail market, estimated at over $100 billion kept the conventional market routes busy.
This is understandable. About 90% of the retailers in the sector have no formal education, and 85% of them prefer to settle their transactions in cash. Though the majority of them have access and own smartphones, the devices are mostly underused, as internet surfing skills don’t appeal to the majority in this bracket.
However, these retailers needed the convenience of e-commerce. Market trips are not minced meat. For some, it takes a full day of physical and mental energy. Transportation costs also eat deep into their profit. The market was thus open to a well tailored technology.
“I watched my mother, a retailer, burn both ends of the candle to provide for both my siblings and me. While studying at a university in China, I saw firsthand how technology could transform and empower communities. So the challenges my mother went through spurred me to create a similar solution for the Nigerian informal retail community,” said Alerzo Limited CEO, Adewale Opaleye.
Alerzo is one of the fast growing B2B e-commerce brands deploying technology to ease business experience for informal retailers in Nigeria, connecting physical stores with digital solutions. TradeDepot, Omnibiz, Wabi2b also play in the sector across Nigeria.
Fully aware that the majority of these retailers have no formal education, e-commerce, through shopping and logistics technology, has simplified the goods ordering process for retailers. They source products from manufacturers based on orders from retailers and deliver them to their stores.
“We’ve made the restocking process easier by making them available on simple channels like USSD codes and WhatsApp. More importantly, we are also training retailers in rural communities on how they can order goods using our app. Improved internet penetration is also helping because many of them have smartphones, they only need little guidance and teaching,” Opaleye added.
B2B e-commerce companies say they also offer market advisory services to retailers to enable them to improve their profit margins.
According to some of the key market players, they recommend popular stock options to retailers based on data gathered from other vendors and market trends observed from consumers. This way, they help retailers introduce new products that establish them as the go-to shop in their locations and attain customer loyalty.
As the online shopping wave gets stronger, the crucial space occupied by informal retailers in the Nigerian setting cannot be ignored. It is therefore noteworthy that digital solutions by e-commerce brands in the sector are showing how technology can complement physical stores, improve market efficiency and facilitate overall digital economy growth.
Kaspersky’s Global Research and Analysis Team (GReAT) experts at the 10th annual Cyber Security Weekend – META 2025 held recently, talked about supply chain attacks and reported that by the end of 2024 a total of 14,000 malicious packages were found in open-source projects, a 48% increase compared to the end of 2023. 42 million versions of open-source packages have been examined by Kaspersky throughout 2024 in search for vulnerabilities.
Open-source is software with source code that anyone can inspect, modify, and enhance. Popular open-source packages include GoMod, Maven, NuGet, npm, PyPI, and others.
These are tools that power countless applications and help developers easily find, install, and manage pre-built code libraries, making it simpler to build software by reusing code others have written. Attackers take advantage of the popularity of these and other packages.
In March 2025, the Lazarus Group was reported to have deployed several malicious npm packages, which were downloaded multiple times before removal. These packages contained malware to steal credentials, cryptocurrency wallet data, and deploy backdoors, targeting developers’ systems across Windows, macOS, and Linux.
The attack leveraged GitHub repositories for added legitimacy, highlighting the group’s sophisticated supply chain tactics. Kaspersky’s GReAT also found other npm packages related to this attack. Malicious npm packages could have been integrated into web development, cryptocurrency platforms, and enterprise software, risking widespread data theft and financial losses.
In 2024, a sophisticated backdoor was discovered in XZ Utils versions 5.6.0 and 5.6.1, a widely used compression library in Linux distributions. Inserted by a trusted contributor, the malicious code targeted SSH servers, enabling remote command execution and threatening countless systems globally.
Detected before widespread exploitation due to performance anomalies, the incident highlighted the dangers of supply chain attacks. XZ Utils is integral to operating systems, cloud servers, and IoT devices, making its compromise a threat to critical infrastructure and enterprise networks.
In 2024, Kaspersky’s GReAT discovered that attackers uploaded malicious Python packages like chatgpt-python and chatgpt-wrapper to PyPI, mimicking legitimate tools for interacting with ChatGPT APIs.
These packages, designed to steal credentials and deploy backdoors, capitalised on the popularity of AI development to trick developers into downloading them. These packages could have been used in AI development, chatbot integrations, and data analytics platforms, endangering sensitive AI workflows and user data.
“Open-source software is the backbone of many modern solutions, but its openness is being weaponised. The 50% rise in malicious packages by the end of 2024 shows attackers are actively embedding sophisticated backdoors and data stealers in popular packages, which millions rely on.
“Without rigorous vetting and real-time monitoring, a single compromised package can trigger a global breach. Organisations need to secure the supply chain before the next XZ Utils-level attack succeeds,” comments Dmitry Galov, Head of Research Center for Russia and CIS at Kaspersky’s Global Research and Analysis Team.
Nigeria Data Protection Commission (NDPC) has launched an investigation into allegations that the confidentiality and integrity of candidates’ personal data may have been compromised by hackers.
The Commission initiated the inquiry following concerns over possible data breaches during examinations.
Preliminary findings indicate that several examination centres may not have implemented adequate technical and organizational measures to safeguard candidates’ personal information, as required under data protection regulations.
Although the incident reportedly affected 379, 997 candidates, the NDPC’s investigation is poised to cover a systemic audit of data processing and third parties.
It will be recalled that JAMB recently admitted that a technical error on its platform affected a total of 379,997 candidates in 157 examination centres across Lagos and the South-East.
Further investigation led to the arrest of at least 20 suspects who are currently in the custody of the Department of State Services and the Nigerian Police Force.
Cyber security firm, Kaspersky, has once again warned that sophisticated cybercriminals increasingly target Africa as ransomware and advanced persistent threats (APTs) escalate across the region.
Speaking at the company’s annual Cyber Security Weekend for the Middle East, Turkiye and Africa (META) region, the cybersecurity firm’s Global Research and Analysis Team highlighted growing digital threats affecting African nations.
Kenya, Nigeria, and South Africa emerged as hotspots, with Kenya recording one of the highest web threat incident rates at 20.1% in first quarter 2025.
“While ransomware is less prevalent in Africa due to lower levels of digitisation and economic constraints, countries like South Africa and Nigeria are seeing a sharp rise in attacks,” said Sergey Lozhkin, head of META and APAC regions at Kaspersky.
Kaspersky noted a 0.01 percentage point increase in African ransomware cases year-on-year, reaching 0.41%, still below global and Middle Eastern averages, but a troubling sign for the continent’s emerging digital infrastructure.
Experts warned that attackers are refining their tactics, shifting focus to unconventional entry points like IoT devices, smart appliances, and misconfigured hardware.
“As these economies expand digitally, sectors such as manufacturing, finance and government are becoming key targets,” said Lozhkin
The cyber-crime landscape is evolving quickly, fuelled by AI tools and dark web access to large language models, which enable less skilled actors to launch convincing phishing and malware campaigns.
Groups like FunkSec, which uses AI-generated code and a low-cost ransom model, are redefining ransomware operations.
“African organisations face the dual challenge of expanding digital footprints and limited cybersecurity awareness. This makes layered defense strategies, including network segmentation, real-time monitoring and regular staff training, essential,” stated Lozhkin
Kaspersky continues to monitor 25 active APT groups in the META region, including SideWinder and MuddyWater, some of which are known to target African institutions.
To bolster defenses, the firm recommends using tools such as its free Anti-Ransomware Tool for Business and the Kaspersky Next suite for threat visibility and response.
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