Nigeria Telecom Gaps Aid Boko Haram, ISWAP, Bandits in Evading Security Tracking — Minister

The Minister of Communications, Innovation, and Digital Economy, Dr. Bosun Tijani, has shone a spotlight on a critical vulnerability in Nigeria’s security infrastructure, confirming that sophisticated criminal groups, including Boko Haram, ISWAP, and bandits, are actively exploiting Nigeria Telecom Gaps to evade surveillance and tracking by security agencies. This revelation underscores a crucial link between technological underdevelopment and the persistence of the nation’s insecurity challenges.

Minister Tijani disclosed that these non-state actors are using special, complex technologies to conceal their locations and operational communications. Their strategy leverages two primary weaknesses within the existing Nigerian telecommunications environment:

1. Exploiting Poor Network Coverage: In many remote areas, the absence of robust, continuous network coverage prevents the accurate triangulation of user locations. Criminals deliberately operate in these network-dark zones, knowing that security forces struggle to gather reliable intelligence via mobile tracking.
2. Call Bouncing Technology: The groups utilize a technique to bounce their calls off multiple cell towers simultaneously. This method deliberately scrambles the location data, making it impossible for security agencies to pinpoint a single point of origin for the communication. The use of this sophisticated technology demonstrates a significant technical evolution in the operational capacity of these criminal elements.

The Minister also addressed the challenges surrounding the government’s efforts to ensure the comprehensive security of the Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) card registration process. Despite the mandatory linkage of SIM cards to the National Identity Number (NIN), the tracking of phones used for criminal activities like kidnapping remains complicated.

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Tijani pointed out that the government cannot always fully track SIMs used for crimes due to several complex factors:

• SIM Registration Integrity: Flaws in the registration process or the use of proxies can lead to inaccurate or unverifiable data linked to criminal SIMs.
• Advanced Counter-Surveillance: The criminals’ use of sophisticated technologies effectively bypasses standard government tracking capabilities, rendering even verified SIM data difficult to locate in real-time.
• Technological Asymmetry: The security agencies are often forced to contend with antiquated tracking systems against criminals equipped with modern counter-surveillance gear.

The Minister assured the public that the government is actively working to bridge these technical gaps. The Ministry is collaborating with the National Communication Commission (NCC) and security agencies to deploy cutting-edge security technologies that can counter the sophisticated methods employed by bandits and terrorists. This includes plans to invest in advanced tracking and intelligence-gathering systems to ensure a more robust and effective response to all forms of criminal activity that rely on telecommunications. The goal is to regain the technological advantage and ensure that no part of the country remains a safe haven for communication-enabled crimes.