By Giwa SHILE
Mr Emmanuel Ezenwere, an Entrepreneur and Artificial Intelligence Engineer, has advised
bank customers to secure their accounts using authentication codes and verified websites to prevent cyber criminals from
gaining access into their accounts.
Ezenwere gave the advice on Thursday in Abuja.
He was reacting to increased reports of cyber criminals hacking into customers’ accounts and stealing funds using technology that
may be difficult for banks to trace how the theft actually happened.
He said both banks and customers had on many occasions lost money to cyber criminals and could not trace the culprits, making them
to doubt the system.
He, therefore, advised that “one needs to have secure platform of banking, if you want to pay into a person’s account, you need
a confirmation code from the person that is receiving.
“Without the confirmation code from that mobile phone, you are not going to be able to withdraw that amount.
“So, having double authentication where both the sender and receiver send codes during transaction makes it impossible
for hackers into an account.
“The other way is to use more secure websites or web platforms as customer, one is to always verify the site you are trying
to make a purchase.”
He explained that one way to do this was to go through what people were saying about such a website, “check the peoples’
reputation and their views about the website.
“So, if you see something new, you don’t just shop from any web application. You have to make sure that other people have
used that application and they don’t have complains.”
Ezenwere added that another way customers could protect their accounts from criminals was by ensuring that they do all
their transactions with their own device only.
“If you use someone else’s device, do not save your account details because they can always bring up that option and
save the transaction details.
“So, don’t save transaction details. Open a private browser, do your transaction and then it ends there.
“That way, your transaction details are not saved on another person’s device.”
The ICT engineer also urged banks to employ good ICT experts that could help to build strong system that would be
impossible for hackers to manipulate, thereby building strong financial systems.
