Last year, a Nigerian national, Seheed Olalejan Adebay’o entered Rwanda and connected with one John Ruzige Gasana, a Rwandan; the two registered a travel and tour agency called Miriensol Holdings Limited.

After registering the company, Gasana went to one of the local banks and acquired a countertop card – Point-of-Sell (POS) device – a machine used to process financial transaction from one bank account to another using a credit or debit card.

In less than a week, the tour and travel company had made US$175,800 (Approx Rwf130 million) in profits from several POS payments all coming from several individuals across Europe.

The rate at which this new company was making profits raised eyebrows to the hosting local bank which engaged police to investigate. 

Police officers launched investigations and started with visiting Miriensol Holdings LTD office but they were shocked to find that a company that seemed to be running loaded bank accounts only had one laptop and a table in their offices.

Both the Nigerian and his Rwandan business partner could not defend their financial statements with proper justification, which resulted to in-depth investigations.

"We discovered that they were using the POS to manipulate cards of their customers, especially those from Europe, and would transfer the money to Miriensol Holdings bank account. The Nigerian was the technician behind the scam while Gasana would withdraw the money and they share it equally,” said Senior Superintendant Eric Kanyabuganza, the Director for the Economic and Financial Crimes unit at Rwanda National Police. 

The two suspects were arrested in January this year and prosecuted.

"This proves that cyber crimes have no borders, it can be committed anywhere at any time, that’s why dealing with them requires joint and concerted efforts,” said Kanyabuganza.

This case is one of several other cyber-related crimes that the police have intercepted.

Cyber related crimes target specific sectors such as mobile money transfer and can be disastrous to the national economy. Last year, out of the 35 cyber crimes reported at RNP, 91.4% were related to mobile money transactions.

"We urge the public to be conscious about any form of transaction, especially electronic transfers. People should verify if the payment is legal or going to the rightful recipient,” Kanyabuganza said.

He pointed out that other common cases where hackers monitor online business negotiations and at the time of transferring the money, the hacker changes the bank account and diverts the money to another account.

According to Kanyabuganza, Police have received complaints related to similar scams including one that involved US$54,000.‎ 

"The victim of the US$54,000 scam was quick to report the case and we contacted our counterparts in the country where the money was due to be withdrawn by the fraudster, they blocked the account before he could withdraw it, and the money was returned to the owner.

"We have also intercepted and arrested people who forge banking tools like bank cheques and those who divert phone calls of the original owner of a bank account so that in any attempt for the bank to verify the cheque, the fraudsters authorizes the transaction as the rightful holder of the account.” 

"We have also dealt with cases of SIM Box fraud, where culprits use GSM bypass technology to bypass the official interconnection terminals by using Voice over Internet protocol (VOIP) to route international traffic to a SIM box (or GSM Gateway) where calls are terminated and subsequently regenerated as local calls. If you are out there and you are making extremely cheap international call, just know something illegal is going on, report to the police immediately,” Kanyabuganza said.

Several other cyber crimes have also been reported among them include identity theft where some culprits create social media accounts in the names of others to swindle or solicit money from the public or targeted individuals.  

In March this year, the government approved the National Cyber Security Policy which aims at protecting public and private infrastructure from cyber attacks and to safeguard personal information of web users, financial or banking information and sovereign data.

The policy is very important for the country given that all aspects of development currently rely on ICT to function better and deliver services.

It will establish an environment that will build trust and confidence when people use ICT and ensure that Rwanda has whatever it takes to protect the interests of its people and also ably collaborate with other countries.

In May this year, a campaign, dubbed "Stay Safe Online,” which was meant to address the growing concerns on cyber crime as more Rwandans continue to embrace Information Communication Technology, saw several institutions engage various users of ICT in the country.

Since last year, Rwanda has been making efforts to protect its cyberspace and has since established a National Computer Security Incident Response Centre to monitor cyber security situation and assess risks.

RNP has so far extended the Interpol I-24/7 communication tool to all border posts. The tool connects all law enforcement agencies in Interpol member countries and allows investigators access Interpol’s range of criminal databases to search and cross check data on suspected criminals or wanted persons, stolen and lost travel documents, stolen motor vehicles, fingerprints, DNA profiles, stolen administrative documents and works of art.

"There are also gender based violence and child abuse crimes committed through technology like child pornography, and in case anyone encounters such, they should immediately call 0788311 778 or toll-free line – 3512,” explained Kanyabuganza, who also gave 0788311152, and 0788311208 to report a cyber crime.