ILORIN, Nigeria—Around November 2020, Kayode said he was invited to a house party—the kind attended mostly by others involved in the country’s i

How the pandemic pulled Nigerian university students into cybercrime

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2021-11-25 21:30:05

ILORIN, Nigeria—Around November 2020, Kayode said he was invited to a house party—the kind attended mostly by others involved in the country’s illicit digital economy.

The college sophomore studying towards a hard sciences degree had reservations about attending a party during a global pandemic, but he didn’t have much other to do than spend time with other so-called “yahoo boys”—an archaic nickname that recalls when Nigerian cyber fraudsters were synonymous with Yahoo Mail and “Nigerian Prince” spam.

The market has now graduated into more complex and targeted schemes, experts told The Record. And Kayode, who wanted to be identified only by this nickname due to security concerns, is one of many young Nigerians who turned to that market as the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted their education and left them with few options.

Since the start of the pandemic, experts say, Nigeria has witnessed an increase not just in the number of people drawn into cybercrime, but also in the complexity of tactics they deploy.