The National Population Commission in Nigeria says its attention has been drawn to misleading and false information made by an uninformed staff of the Commission and Comptroller of Chanchaga LGA in Niger State, Mr Sanusi Maigida that the Commission’s Website has been hacked.
The information reaching the Commission stated that this led to “the postponement of the LGA-level training of the Supervisors and Enumerators for the 2023 Population and Housing Census.”
Press Release
NPC Server was not hacked pic.twitter.com/OIOZUI1CSn
— National Population Commission (@natpopcom) April 24, 2023
The Commission through the Director of the Public Affairs Department Dr Isiyaka Yahaya stated that: “the statement made by Mr Sanusi Maigida is false and does not represent the true position of things as regards the Commission’s server.”
Yahaya also stated that Mr Sanusi Maigida “acted without directive and authorization from the Commission’s Headquarters in Abuja and currently facing disciplinary action for such embarrassing misinformation.”
Dr Yahaya noted that “As a staff in the LGA Office of the NPC, Mr Maigida has limited knowledge about the NPC server or its workability.”
“The Commission wishes to state that its server is solidly intact and ready to be deployed for the upcoming 2023 Population and Housing Census exercise,” he noted.
The Commission stated that it has implemented comprehensive security measures to safeguard our servers, applications, and IT infrastructure, “as part of measures to ensure the confidentiality and integrity of data for the 2023 Census”.
“These security measures include robust firewalls, intrusion detection and prevention systems, regular security audits, encryption protocols, and multi-factor authentication for privileged accounts,” the Commission reiterated.
The Commission also gave the assurance that “the public that the security of the data for the 2023 Population and Housing Census is absolutely guaranteed.” and “The Commission is committed to upholding the highest standards of data protection and maintaining the trust placed in us by the Nigerian population”.
Consequently, the public is advised to disregard the false statement trending online about the hacking of the Commission’s server and the subsequent travel of the NPC Chairman to restore the purported hacked server.
The Commission has assured Nigerians and development partners that it will “continue to update the populace on developments regarding the 2023 Population and Housing Census as events unfold”.
The Commission also called on “everyone to support the Commission to ensure a secure and successful 2023 Census exercise”.
Setting the record straight on recent time the Chairman of the National Population Commission in Nigeria Mr Nasir Kwarra on a mission to attend the 56th Session of the United Nations Commission on Population and Development “presented Nigeria’s statement on ‘Population and Development’ at the global event and has returned to continue the NPC’s preparations towards the conduct of the first digital and green Census in Nigeria”.
Over the years, it has been the standard practice for the Chairman of the Commission to attend the annual event on Population and Development in line with the mandate of NPC as the coordinating agency on population matters in Nigeria.
N.O
