African countries urged to unite in war against cybercrime

Participants at an international conference on cybercrime in the Senegalese capital Dakar on Tuesday urged African countries to coordinate their efforts in the fight against cybercrime.

"The strategy for digital security cannot be developed by a single country. It requires involvement of all countries. Cyberspace does not have borders," said Dominique Riban, Deputy Director General of the French National Agency for Information Systems Security.

"Attackers come from anywhere in the world. They go through different countries before arriving on the system," he said.

"It is therefore only through close collaboration between states that they will manage to defeat this cybercrime," he said.

The U.S. estimates that 500 billion U.S. dollars are lost annually throughout the world due to cybercrime.

The technical advisor to Cote d'Ivoire's Telecommunications Regulation Authority Philippe Kouame said that in 2015 his country lost about 4 billion CFA Francs (about 7 million U.S. dollars) due to cybercrime.

"This figure was a reduction vis-a-vis the 2014 figure when the country lost 5.3 billion CFA Francs," Kouame added.

El Hadji Ndiogou Diouf, a director at Senegal's Investment Promotion Ministry, said that cybersecurity is a major concern for the overall security of states.

"Cyberspace remains a tool for propaganda and a source of funding for illegal activities," Diouf said.

"The fight against cybercrime will guarantee state security, reinforce protection of Internet users, reduce all criminal acts and guarantee economic growth for all," he added.

The two-day Dakar forum brings together experts from African governments as well as international experts to discuss issues related to cybercrime and measures to secure information systems. Endit