The President, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has assured that, in line with international industry best practices, government will soon establish a national cyber security authority, to effectively regulate and oversee the cyberspace of the country.
Speaking at the opening session of the climax of the National Cyber Security Awareness Month in Accra on Monday, the President said, in addition to the establishment of the authority, government will set up a cyber training academy and ensure the enactment of the cyber security Act.
“In our effort to pursue international cooperation’s engagements as part of our measure to address the emergence of cyber-crime, Ghana has ratified the Africa Union (AU) convention on cybersecurity and personal data protection, becoming the first country in the continent to do so,” he said.
Budapest convention
The President also noted that, the convention on cyber-crime, known as the Budapest convention has been signed, and is hopeful that Parliament will ratify this convention in its upcoming sittings next week.
“These two international treaties would enhance Ghana’s collaboration with other countries in terms of policies, technical and operational levels in dealing with cyber security issues,” he indicated.
Through this collaboration, law enforcement agencies in Ghana would be able to receive information and key pieces of records from other jurisdiction to support prosecution and investigations of cyber-crimes.
“As we scale up E-connectivity, as part of government’s digitization agenda, it would certainly bring about an upsurge of criminal activity, if we do not put in place precautionary measures to forestall such activities,” the President cautioned.
Response centres
As part of the cyber security awareness month, the president launched the Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) for the telecommunication sector at the National Communications Authority. This is to serve as one of the measures to broadly increase the responsiveness of the sector.
Furthermore a security operation center has been setup at the Bank of Ghana to facilitate cyber security incidence monitoring and ensure cyber friendly information sharing, among players within the financial sector.
He assured that government is determine to provide the necessary funding for cyber security, to ensure there is cyber security soundness in the country.
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