Fraud and Forgeries Activities On The Rise In Nigeria; But Are Nigerians Getting Wiser?

The Financial Institutions Training Centre (FITC) has released reports on Fraud and Forgeries in Nigerian Banks for the first quarter (Q1) of the year 2021.

Funnily enough, the highlight of the report shows that fraudulent activities in our financial institutions are on the rise, and Nigerians are getting wiser to identify some scam alerts.

Several tools are being devised by scammers to lure innocent Nigerians to fall victims to their treacherous activities in order to take away their hard-earned money without a second thought.

In Brand News Day findings, as against twenty-eight thousand, six hundred and ninety-two (28,692) cases of reported fraud and forgeries in the fourth quarter of the year 2020, a total of fifty-nine thousand and forty-five (59,445) cases of fraud and forgeries were reported in the first quarter of 2021. It represents an increase of 107.18 per cent between the two periods.

The total amount involved in reported cases of fraud and forgeries for the first quarter of the year 2021 is ₦11.697 billion. The report indicates a fall of 36.71 per cent, amounting to N18.4B involved in the same reported cases for the last quarter of the year 2020.

Foreign Exchange Fraud and Forgeries

Foreign exchange related fraud accounts for the most amount involved in fraud and forgeries reported for the period under review for 6.6 billion naira representing 56.84 per cent of the total fraud and forgeries cases.

Moving forward, it follows by computer web fraud which accounted for 11.90 per cent, forged cheques with forged signatures (10.11%), ATM withdrawals (8.58%), mobile fraud (8.08%), and fraudulent withdrawals (2.17%) of the total amount involved in the reported fraud and forgery cases in the first quarter of the year 2021. Correspondently, other reported cases of fraud and forgery include, POS fraud; opening and operating fraudulent loans, and suppression of entries, cash theft, and armed robbery.

However, despite the involvement of ₦11.697 billion in the reported cases of frauds and forgeries, only ₦726,439 million is recorded as actual losses. It shows a significant decrease of 59.79% as a total of 1.80 billion naira was the loss recorded for the fourth quarter of the year 2020. The breakdown of the actual losses suffices.

Summary of Q1 2021 Fraud and Forgeries

In summary, as mobile fraud accounted for 8.08 per cent of the total amount involved in fraud, it surprisingly showed the highest losses with ₦345,988,447.80 (47.63%). Meanwhile, The foreign exchange also accounted for 56.84 per cent of the total fraud and forgeries cases only accounted for 0.05 of the actual loss. Following mobile fraud in the order of the actual loss are fraudulent withdrawals that accounted for 19.73%, computer/web fraud (15.25%), POS fraud (6.82%), and suppression of entries (3.73%). Others are theft of cash (2.05%), armed robberies (1.45%), forged cheques with forged signatures (1.35%), ATM withdrawals (0.77%), and opening and operating fraudulent loans and accounts (0.40%).

In conclusion, these figures become worthy to note that there was a decrease of 107.18 per cent in the reported cases of fraud and forgeries for the q1 of 2021, an amount involved and more importantly, the amount lost, has drastically reduced.

It has left these questions in the mouth of this writer: are Nigerians getting wiser of scams?

Are Nigerian financial institutions using any measure to create awareness of cybercrime?

Are people getting wiser because of their past experiences?