Nigeria establishes Centre to tackle cyber threats on digital infrastructures

The Nigerian government says the newly commissioned National Shared Service Centre, NSSC would tackle emerging cyber threats on digital infrastructures in the country.

Managing Director of Galaxy Backbone Limited, Professor Muhammad  Abubakar, stated this while speaking with Journalists after President Muhammadu Buhari commissioned the Centre in Abuja, Nigeria’s Capital.

He stated that the project was completed with ninety-nine per cent of the Internally Generated Revenue by the Galaxy backbone.

Professor Abubakar added that “there was no intervention from anywhere. And the remaining 1 per cent is the provision of some equipment.”

The Galaxy Backbone Boss noted that today’s 4th Industrial-Revolution world of rapid changes was driven by ubiquitous connectivity to the Cyber world and advanced digital technologies.

He stressed that the Centre would protect all Government digital data from cyber-attacks and foster adequate data storage.

“We have a security operation centre inside the newly commissioned National Shared Services Centre built mainly to curb cyber threats. We have seen the number of emails coming into Galaxy’s network and other government agencies.”

“You also have some of the equipment and devices we have put in place to ensure that those emails do not threaten the government’s system. About 90 per cent of the emails coming to the galaxy network were sieved out as they were spam and 10 per cent were real mail. Now, users will not have a problem dealing with the mail because they have already been sieved out,” Professor Abubakar added.

The GBB Boss explained that the Centre is imperative as all services in all the government Ministries, Department and Agencies are being digitalised.

He gave the assurance that “when we factor in the enormous capacity for Data Hosting, Collocation and Cloud Computing which the Edifice being commissioned brings on board, Nigeria is certainly becoming well-placed to take its pride of place in the emerging digital world”.

While enumerating  other achievements of the Agency, He said Galaxy has built a multi-platform ICT infrastructure connecting more than 400 Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) into a “one government” network platform known as 1-Gov.net and currently deploying terrestrial (Fibre) broadband connectivity to 30 States of the Federation.

He further said that  Galaxy Backbone has also made significant strides to inspire the confidence of its customers.

This “including becoming the first public sector establishment to attain prestigious International Certifications that include the ISO 27001 in Information Security Management; the ISO 20000 Certification in IT Service Management as well as the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI-DSS)”

Prof Abubakar used the opportunity to appreciate President  Buhari and the  Minister of Communications and Digital Economy,  for their efforts in ensuring the growth in the ICT sector.