Folayan speaks to spams and scams in Nigeria

Courtesy: Sunday Folayan/2002

The Vice president of the Nigeria Internet Registration Association (NIRA) and former Secretary of the Internet Service Providers Association of Nigeria (ISPAN), Mr. Sunday Folayan has highlighted the difference between spam and scam mails.

Describing the prevalence of spam and scam mails as pests confronting Internet Service Providers (ISPs), Mr. Folayan said that both the nation and ISPs are under siege, hence the nation deserves assistance in formulating policies to check the scourge of scam mails.

Speaking recently in a paper entitled “Dealing with Spams and Scams: an ISP’s Perspective” made available to DigitalSENSE Business News in the wake of recent reports that ‘World’s Most Crime-Ridden ISP Found in Nigeria,’ he noted that the pests include the Unsolicited Commercial Email (UCE), which is usually described as spam most of the time, and comes from the Internet to ISP’s customers.

He explained that the so-called Nigerian Scam Mail (NSM) otherwise known as (419) is scam all of the time, originating from ISP’s customers to the Internet, and on how severe the situation is, Folayan said that from Internet to ISPs Clients accounts for about 50 in 1000 UCEs and 1 in 1000 NSM, conversely those coming from ISPs clients to the Internet amounts to five (5) in every 1000 UCEs and 200 in every 1000 of the purported Nigerian Scam Mails.

The internet guru pointed out that transmission of UCEs come in three ways, namely the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP), Hyper-Text Transfer Protocol (HTTP) and Secure Hyper-Text Transfer Protocol (HTTPS).

In other to stem the tide, he said ISPs could fight spam through customer education to avoid sites that request for mandatory registration in exchange for free services, alleging that these sites “only harvest addresses, to re-sell to spammers.”

Also, he said that ISPs filter the addresses, that is, Internet Protocol (IP) and domains of well-known spammers in addition to installing mail scanners, which could identify well known spams and filter same before delivery to clients’ mailboxes.

He lamented that Nigerian ISPs are being hit worldwide for scam mails, noting that several ISPs have suffered unnecessary downtimes, because their upstream disconnected them for reported Nigerian Scam Mails (NSM).

“IP addresses allocated to Nigerian ISPs are sometimes blacklisted on some websites” he decried.

Further, he said that scammers like to be anonymous, so ISPs often request for registration details and insistence that dialup accounts must have a contact phone line.

“Telephone numbers are dialed to confirm they are serviceable and functional before accounts are setup,” he reassured, adding that fraudulent accounts, either dial-up or wireless are disconnected immediately on discovery.

Sunday Folayan

While SMTP borne mails, he said, are scanned and sometimes filtered, based on ISPs acceptable use policy, even as the internet service providers share information, report to the police of suspicions.

He, therefore recommended that no doubt, spams and scams largely could be said to be crime, the law enforcement agents need training and very urgently too, whereas legislation over the Internet access and usage needs review to enhance speedy trial, stiff penalties should be meted out to those caught in the act.

 
Equally, Folayan prescribed a uniform national identity (ID) scheme while stressing the need to create more jobs for Nigerians.

Remmy Nweke/DSBNews
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