Nigeria has called for closer cooperation with the United Kingdom (UK) and United States to dismantle cybercrime networks through intelligence sharing and coordinated enforcement operations.
Bashir Abdullahi, an assistant commissioner of police who led the Nigerian delegation to the recent Fraud Joint Disruptions Week in the UK, said efforts to tackle cybercrime must go beyond arresting individual suspects.
The delegation comprised officials of the Nigeria Police Force National Cybercrime Centre (NPF-NCCC) and the Joint Case Team on Cybercrime (JCTC), established under the office of the attorney-general of the federation and minister of justice.
Abdullahi, who represented Olatunji Disu, the inspector-general of police (IGP), identified fraudulent accounts, communication channels, digital infrastructure, facilitators and illicit financial networks as critical targets for law enforcement agencies.
“The fight against cybercrime must go beyond the arrest of individual suspects to include the dismantling of the wider criminal networks that facilitate such activities,” a statement issued on Sunday quoted Abdullahi as saying.
“I hereby reaffirm Nigeria’s commitment to working with the United Kingdom’s National Crime Agency (NCA), United States law enforcement agencies, Meta and other international partners to transform shared intelligence into timely, coordinated and measurable enforcement outcomes.”
He said stronger collaboration would help law enforcement agencies identify common criminal targets and infrastructure, coordinate operations and disrupt fraud networks operating across Africa and beyond.
Abdullahi also called for closer engagement with technology companies, including Meta, Google and Microsoft, to support investigations and prosecutions.
The police chief said timely access to relevant information, preservation of digital evidence and effective channels for lawful information requests were essential to tackling cyber-enabled offences.
Abdullahi said the establishment of the NPF-NCCC demonstrated Nigeria’s determination to tackling cybercrime through specialised law enforcement capabilities.
According to him, the centre had continued to improve its investigative and digital forensic capabilities, strengthen inter-agency coordination and expand international partnerships.
He noted that while digital technology had become indispensable to communication, commerce and innovation, it had also created opportunities for online fraud, identity theft, child exploitation, human trafficking and other transnational crimes.
He said the increasingly sophisticated and borderless nature of the threats meant no country or law enforcement institution could tackle them alone.
He also highlighted the Nigeria-UK security and defence partnership as a framework for sharing active cyber threat intelligence and conducting joint operations.
According to him, Operation Rabbit Hole, Operations Seraphim 1 and 2, and Operation Cadre demonstrate the benefits of intelligence sharing, joint planning and coordinated enforcement against cross-border cybercrime.
