CRIME ON THE NET

Criminals make a killing defrauding online consumers

Many commit cybercrime in Botswana without even knowing it

Members of the public have been warned against criminals who steal vital information from unsuspecting victims by sending malicious email attachments, which have Trojans, malware and backdoors.

Criminals, according to Nonofo Dichabe of the Botswana Police Service, pose as a legitimate institution to lure individuals into providing sensitive data such as banking PINs and credit or debit card details and passwords.

Other criminals have been impersonating prominent persons and soliciting for donations for Covid19 to assist the vulnerable.

Dichabe acknowledges that as members of the public continue to embrace the use of new technologies especially electronic commerce to conduct purchases, criminals also have managed to exploit the vulnerabilities inherent within the new social landscape. Among trends, the police have discovered that change of supplier details has increased. This is where a company receives emails attached with requests for quotations allegedly from big corporations like Botswana Power Corporation, Botswana Railways, Air Botswana and mines for the supply of equipment. Large sums of money are then paid to the alleged supplier based outside the country and goods are never delivered. “Others are defrauded through purchasing goods advertised on Facebook.” This form of crime according to the Police, experienced a surge in recent times because companies have increasingly been making online transfers as opposed to the physical transactions at bank halls.

“Banking details were thus changed through unscrupulous means,” Dichabe says. There was also a rise in fake adverts concerning companies dealing with Covid19 prevention and containment equipment. “Individuals and companies were using branding for reputable companies when tendering. Some manufactured sub-standard materials like sanitisers but used the reputable companies to brand their products.” The police have also noticed that digital or mobile money fraud has increased. Dichabe is however, worried that these often go unreported and therefore presents a difficulty of knowing the real extent of the problem. The lack of reporting also affects issues concerning cyber bullying or offensive electronic communication where spats take place on social media and fizzle out and are never reported.

He cautions lovers not to get overly excited to a point where they take pornographic videos of themselves in happier times, because as soon as the relationship sours, they use the videos to get back at each other. “Revenge pornography is a problem. Because good times roll into bad times and partners start blackmailing each other,” Dichabe says. The Police have also discovered a modus operandi of criminals who steal the identity of unsuspecting individuals and use them to obtain loans from financial institutions with forged identity documents, payslip, bank statement, and letter of employment confirmation. Dichabe says because cyber crime goes beyond boundaries, cross border investigations have been a challenge because of restricted movements due to Covid19.

“Some challenges are created by the anonymity that information and communication technology affords to users,” he says, adding that anonymity enables individuals or criminals to engage in activities without revealing themselves and or their actions to others thus making it difficult to effect arrest of perpetrators. Botswana Police has since set up an institutional framework to deal with cybercrime including enforcing legislation such as Cybercrime and Computer related Crimes Act, the Penal Code, Electronic Records (Evidence) Act, Botswana Communications Regulatory Authority Act and Data Protection Act. Meanwhile, thousands of people commit cybercrime per week in Botswana, and might not even know it. According to a member of the Botswana Communications Regulatory Authority (BOCRA) Cyber Insider Response Team (CIRT) Mafoko Lebogang, up to 17 000 people download unauthorised materials including movies and music in a space of seven (7) days.

Figures at BOCRA show that as at September 30, 2020 there were 830 000 facebook subscribers in Botswana, while internet penetration is at 47 percent.