JAMB hands over 38 operators to law enforcement agencies for cyber crime
Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) on Wednesday handed over 38 operators of various Computer Based Test (CBT) centres drawn from the six geopolitical zones to law enforcement officers for alleged cyber crime using the Virtual Private Network (VPN).
VPN extends a private network across a public network and enables users to send and receive data across shared or public networks as if their computing services were directly connected to the private network.
The operators were accused of extending the VPN to illegal outposts to register some candidates for the 2020 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) and those seeking admission through Direct Entry (DE).
During a one-on-one engagement between the JAMB Registrar, Prof. Is-haq Oloyede, and the arrested CBT operators at the board’s headquarters in Bwari, revealed that some registered fictitious names and National Identity Numbers (NIN) with JAMB as staff of the CBT centres.
By implication, the fate of all UTME/DE candidates who knowingly or ignorantly registered at the illegal registration centres is presently unknown as there’s no clear indication if they would be allowed to sit for this year’s examinations or other arrangements would be put in place to capture them.
“An average parent does not want the child to queue even for 10 minutes. They will prefer that they will go and pay this people extra money and they will claim to have done it for them not knowing the incalculable damage that they are doing to their own children.
“Even if we have destroyed our own generation, let the incoming generations have the opportunity of building a better tomorrow for us and that’s our position. As far as we are concerned, a prima facie case of cyber crime has been established against them.
“The appropriate security agencies will take over from here and deal with the matter. They will go and give their statements to the law enforcement agencies. Ours is just to arrest them; we can’t say they will go to prison. It’s beyond us; it’s the judge who will determine that. We have done our own part, but please help us appeal to candidates and their parents to go through the normal process.
“All those candidates that have been defrauded knew that they were not registering at the right place and they were going there thinking that it will work. At the end of the day, it will not work and when it will not work, that time the press will be saying JAMB does not know what it’s doing.”
Oloyede warned all owners and operators of JAMB approved CBT centres to strictly adhere to the laid down rules and regulations in registering candidates. He added that JAMB was better equipped to monitor and track all illegality surrounding its activities in any part of the country.
“Other CBT centres should keep within the regulations. When we ask you to register candidates, endeavour to register them according to the rules, nothing outside the law should be done.
“We have published the list of all the centres and they are available in all our state offices across the country and in our weekly bulletin, including those we have blacklisted. Let people register in approved CBT centres and no candidate should give their password or code to anybody not even to your parents,” he added.
