In its 20 years of worldwide use, the internet has opened up and expanded the frontiers of communication beyond the wildest dream of the most optimistic tech savvy. Great distance is no longer a barrier to converse with one another.
All you need is a click of the mouse.
E-mail, facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Skype – all part of the social media fabric on the internet – help create new friendships and revive old ones.
But, as it is with almost everything in life, the internet has its negative sides.
There are stories of scammers using it to dupe. They use the identities of prominent personalities, such as actors, musicians and politicians to defraud and wreak sorrow on individuals.
Fake facebook profiles
Enoch Adeboye, General Overseer of Redeemed Christian Church of God, is said to have up to 18 fake facebook accounts, while actor Ramsey Nouah’s fake facebook accounts are suspected to be over 20.
Recently, Nollywood Director, Tchidi Chikere, gave the following reasons for dumping facebook for good.
“Dear friends,” he wrote on his wall for the last time, “this is to announce that I am quitting facebook in 24 hours. This is among other reasons due to the activities of scammers and impostors.
“I have over 11 fake profiles on facebook, and can no longer deal with reports of the activities of fakes using my name.
“Facebook team has demonstrated their inability to curb this trend as well as guarantee the privacy of users. At least now, as many people as possible will know that Tchidi Chikere is not on facebook and any profile operating under his name is fake.
“I also do not have a Twitter account, I had deactivated that long ago for similar reasons. My management and I shall work out another way to keep in touch with my fans and friends.”
Defrauding through website
Movie producer, Fidelis Duker, recounted to TheNiche his own experiences at the hands of internet scammers: “I have had several. A couple of young men will just go to my website and use it to send emails to young aspiring actors telling them that we register young actors, that they should pay money and all that.
“I have had that experience a couple of times and I have been able to alert the police.
“They just go online and copy my phone number and all that. And then, they go on facebook and advertise my company, that we are looking for actors, and then people begin to talk to them.
“You know, so many young people are so gullible and want to become popular and want to be on TV, and they fall for these fraudsters who send them emails with account numbers and ask them to pay certain amounts.
“Most times, these young (aspiring) actors will call me to confirm if I have got their money. I am always shocked. We never ask people to pay! We never collect money to act at any point!”
Senate weighs in
The Senate weighed in on October 23 by passing a bill prescribing seven years’ jail for internet scammers.
However, for Duker, a jail term of seven years is too short for internet criminals. “I feel it should be about 25 years because it is detrimental to the economy. It is an embarrassment to the country. That’s why when we travel abroad, we see every Nigerian artiste as a 419, a fraudster.
“You get the point? So, I think the punishment should be more than that. I think it is a bit too lax, because internet scam is like killing people.
“In America and the United Kingdom, one of the biggest crimes is fraud, even considered greater than murder. That is why we must begin to curtail their excesses. It should attract more than seven years, in my opinion.”
Concern over lack of implementation
But former Ikeja branch Chairman of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), Monday Ubani, said the seven years’ jail term is appropriate.
His words: “The point is that the legislative arm of government is under duty to regulate behaviour, especially the criminal behaviour of individuals in society.
“And if you don’t have any law whatsoever, they cannot in any way convict any person of any crime because the Constitution says for anyone to be charged with any criminal offence, that person must be brought under the law.
“You cannot in any way charge anybody with any offence which is not written down, and so, in the first place, what the National Assembly members have done is to enact a criminal law that says if you involve yourself in internet fraud, this is the jail term sentence you will pass through if you are convicted.
“So it is good to make such a law.”
Ubani expressed concern, however, that the new law may not be implemented, like many others in the land.
“It is not as if we are short of good laws, but they don’t have the capacity sometimes to implement them. That’s why you see all manner of criminality going on in the country.”
