Sign Digital Rights Bill to Stem Internet Fraud, President Tinubu Urged

Ahmad Sorondinki in Kano

The Centre for Information Technology and Development (CITAD) has urged President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to sign the Digital Rights Bill in order to checkmate internet fraud and ensure data privacy and protection.

The Executive Director of CITAD, Alhaji Yunusa Zakari Ya’u, made the call at a two-day training on ‘Digital Rights, Protection Mechanism, and Online Security Tools for Digital Rights Activists’, in Kano yesterday.

During his presentation at the workshop organised by CITAD in conjunction with Avocats San Frontieres France, Ya’u noted that the bill has been with the National Assembly for over eight years, pointing out that once the bill is legislated in Nigeria, internet users would know that their digital rights are guaranteed by law.

He said: “The purpose of this gathering is to enhance the capacity of journalists, activists, and lawyers on how they can remain online and also for them to identify threats as well respond to those threats online.

“Digital space has become a critical component of our lives. Digital space is not just free, however, it has some challenges and threats to individuals, especially the journalists, activists, and lawyers.”

Ya’u added that: “Our lives are becoming more online. We communicate with our friends, families, and companies, and at work. You digitally engage government agencies and departments.

“Hence, there’s a need for journalists, actors, and lawyers to understand what these threats are, the challenges, the needs, and what to do. As citizens, we need to protect these rights, and when they are violated digitally, we need to know ways to report these rights to the appropriate authority.”

He, however, added that the government has to respond to one of the issues, which is data protection, by signing it into law, which indicates that if one’s data protection is being violated, the person can report to a data protection agency for redress, “but that issue is a piecemeal approach to what Nigerians were yearning for, as what we were calling for is for the government to quickly legislate on Digital Rights Bill.”

Speaking at the event, the Country Director of the Avocats San Frontieres France, Angela Uwandu Uzoma-Iwuchukwu, disclosed that the workshop was aimed at building capacity for journalists on professional mechanisms, and the safe use the of internet without intimidation or harassment while they discharging their duties.