Emeka: And hope you had a great week. Your one and only Mommy G.O sent to your greetings. My name is Emeka Aaron, your number one celebrity show host, and I’m excited to be here again on another episode of The Good Citizen Radio Show, which is brought to you by CSR-in-Action and proudly sponsored by Act Foundation. We’ll go on a short commercial break. The show continues.
Did you know that according to a report by the Nigerian Communications Commission, NCC, that there are about 151,000,000 active Internet subscriptions in Nigeria, representing 78.7% internet penetration rate? However, what does this penetration rate implies? Exactly, what difference does it make to the reality of the average Nigerian? And what is the level of inclusivity in access to the internet across the country? These questions and more of what we’re going to be talking about today on the show. And the Telecommunications and Technology Sustainability Working Group TTSWG, a multi stakeholder network of corporations and organizations committed to the development of the sector through global best practices, innovation and thought leadership in business sustainability. Today, we will be having a member organization of TTSWG discuss about the relationship between Internet accessibility and national development. We have in the studio Mrs. Dolapo Ogundoro, the manager of customer service at Phase Three Telecoms. Good afternoon and I hope you’re good today.
Dolapo: Yes, I am. Good. Good afternoon. Trust you are too.
Emeka: Yes, I am. I see you were rushing into the studio because of the weather.
Dolapo: That was necessary. No one would want to get caught up in the weather.
Emeka: And the way it changed today was just like the weather in London. They say the weather in the UK is very confused. It can change anytime, my dear.
Dolapo: Wouldn’t it be nice to have such kind of weather? At least you are pretty chilled.
Emeka: Really? Do you think we can cope with that?
Dolapo: I don’t know.
Emeka: For me, I don’t think we can cope with that. Not just yet. Right? Okay, so how is phase three telecoms walking to expand Internet accessibility in Nigeria? And what are some of the biggest challenges facing Nigeria in terms of expanding Internet accessibility?
Dolapo: Okay, so recently we rebranding from just being Phase 3 Telecom to Phase 3 Technologies. Because of that, we have incorporated some new verticals on our Internet services as compared to just the legacy business that we actually offer, which is just Internet service. So, this rebranding has actually become a natural need for service expansion on its own. So as a result, we have actually been working to expand our services, our infrastructures, albeit we have our infrastructure, our services plan across the states of the country, even up until some rural areas, but it’s something we are still working on progressively. And in respect to the challenges that have been experienced by Nigeria regarding this, I’ll just list about three. We have insecurity, so we know that the security state of the country itself is not so fantastic. So people actually get scared.
Emeka: I like the way you put it. Not so fantastic.
Dolapo: Yeah, it’s not so fantastic. Yeah, there’s hope. So people actually find it hardly difficult to say they want to go into those interior or remote places to actually say they want to invest, because the fear of your personal security first, before any other thing, then secondly, we have the issue of assessing capital. That’s for the telecom businesses. So most often than not we hear agricultural loans, educational loans, but hardly would you really think that has to do with telecommunication loans and all of that. So accessing and, you know, telecom itself is like a huge project. It involves a huge capital, hardly. So having to run that on your own can be something. So accessing this capital is also an issue generally for investors, people who really want to get into this kind of business, then the cost of importing materials. Nigeria is not really a country that actually manufactures, manufactures, manufactures. So and for the materials that we need to set up, some of these infrastructures are mostly imported. And obviously, we can see what the foreign market, the exchange rate is saying that alone too, is also a challenge to people who really want to or businesses who really want to get involved.
Emeka: Wow. Yeah, I can imagine. I can imagine that’s it so some of the biggest problems facing us as a nation are unemployment, poverty, poor education, poor healthcare, and insecurity, just like you mentioned. So how do you think internet accessibility can help solve these problems?
Dolapo: Okay, so I’ll just try and take that in an atomized manner. I’ll pair unemployment and poor education together. Having access to the internet itself, it makes it easier to find them employment opportunities. When the internet is available, you can easily go online or have access to the internet. You can easily surf, and then you can get all the information you want in respect to employment opportunities. But the reach that this internet gives us is greater the platform it gives us. Because you can imagine, take for example, the street telecom. There was no internet access in Nigeria. The street telecom was recruiting the information. The rich would be barely minimal as compared to when it’s healthier. And anybody can just go there into the internet and then find the information there. Like you can have it over even across the world in milliseconds, not to even talk of just the same thing. For education, you can actually go online. Based on the access you have. For Internet, you can go online. You can have access to all these online learning platforms, which kind of equates with some of the exposure or knowledge we even get from schools like Physical education. So, you can brush up, you can increase your knowledge based on what you really need.
Emeka: Right now there are a lot of free sites
Dolapo: Exactly things for even kids. Like babies, all you just need is just to plug in, have access to the Internet. Then we also have that for we have a poor health care. So, it’s very annoying when you go to some hospitals and then sometimes you have to wait for long because they are looking for your file or they are looking for one thing or the other. But Internet access makes their process seamless the flow, it just moves. So, one thing Internet does is it gives ease of access to it helps those workers with ease of access to their patient’s information, their record, that’s the historical record of this patient. And then it makes whatever research sometimes we feel like when we go to the hospital, the doctors, the doctors don’t really know what they are doing. They themselves can go online and update their knowledge base. As per okay, about my sector, what’s going on? What is the most recent equipment we need to get on board? These are the things that the Internet accessibility offers the health care center. So, thereby improving our health care sector. Then also for the Insecurity, like I said already, I mentioned earlier, as for how the Insecurity affects people wanting to invest. But in respect to this, what Internet access we give to Insecurity is that it will further enhance our intelligence agencies. Like, take for example, you hear that there are some mist rants perpetrating some very interesting kind of acts somewhere. Based on all this, based on the internet accessibility, you can have your special images; you can get the footage’s recordings within the blink of an eye. And you don’t necessarily need to be at that location if you even have a department or unit. Branches in such locations, you can have them send it to you. Encrypted, I’m saying encrypted because, you know, information is key as well. If you get out there anyhow, it can also be misused. So yeah, and generally when all these things are put in place, obviously the poverty aspect of it will get better because when you have employment, you have good education, you know what you do, you know what you can offer, you can sell of it. Then you also be able to you to put that into good game.
Emeka: That’s a very good one. Well explained. Thank you very much. Okay, so how is your company walking to promote social and environmental sustainability in the provision of Internet accessibility in Nigeria? So we’re talking about sustainability here now?
Dolapo: Yes, and we’re talking about sustainability. We’re talking about both the social and the environmental. Okay. So, Phase 3 Telecom is actually committed to using committee using our technology and telecom prowess to promote our Internet accessibility in Nigeria. And just last year, Chairman impression of Mr. Stanley Jegede in the company of our management team actually inaugurated and gave out, like, we deployed a free service to one of our social responsibility partner right now, which is ICICE, that International Center for Islamic Culture and Education. And not just them, not just the institution. We also availed it to the institution mosque and also the academic, the school. So, this is one of our social sustainability and responsibility programs that we run, amongst others that we run in history. And offering them this has optimized the organization or the institutions from our learning, their training and cultural programs as well as the operational goals. Therefore, the environmental sustainability part, well, we deal with fibers and fiber solutions are actually harmless to the environment. They do not emit dangerous substances, either liquid, solid or gas. So environmentally, the business materials, even stations, transmission stations are multiplied by solar, which works well for equipment. So I think we’re very environmentally stable.
Emeka: I think like that part by solar because with diesel and all the other stuff that you have to run to keep the plants running, the emission that we’re still talking about, still going back into the air.
Okay. So do you have any opinion, questions or suggestions about the topic being discussed today? We would love to hear from you. So you can reach us on our phone line on 0700923923923, or you can send us a WhatsApp message on 08173136193. While we wait for your call, the conversation continues. So Dolapo, the TTSWG has a novel initiative which seeks to establish a handshake between town and gown by providing internship for promising young students in tech organizations like HP and secondment for lecturers so they can gain practical experience outside the academic classroom. Is this something your organization would like to encourage internship and secondment?
Dolapo: So first of all, we actually do have a great partnership. Partnership in supporting of the ideas and ensuring excellence is rendered. Also I just want to mention that History Foundation is currently making plans to organize an inter university polytechnic competition. Residents across tech related discipline will be invited and the best will be giving paid internship.
Emeka: Paid internship?
Dolapo: Yeah, paid internship. But as regarding this, I’m sure our management would be open to such like I mentioned earlier, we have great history of partnership in things like this. We are also excited to also want to add value to understand to the system. So, I’m sure our management is definitely going to be open to discussing this and they can consider jointly with TTSWG, we could consider looking at areas that would benefit both organizations.
Emeka: Okay, we’ll take a short break now and when we return, the show continues. It’s still the good citizen radio show. Don’t go anywhere. Welcome back. It’s still the good citizen radio show. And if you’re just joining me, we’re talking to Mrs. Dolapo Ogundoro. I would still love to hear from you all about your opinions and questions and suggestions about the Internet accessibility for national development. And you can reach us on our phone lines on 0700923923923 or you can reach us on our WhatsApp number on 08173136193 So Dolapo, I was just asking of us to hear about the duration for the internship.
Dolapo: So the duration for the internship, I think it will be based off like I said, it’s a competition. That’s a particular one I mentioned here. It’s a project that we are trying to take on board and it’s going to be a competitive project. So the duration will be, I’m sure it’s going to be in agreement or in alliance with the University of Choice or the Polytechnic of choice. Okay, so if your department or your faculty is saying it’s going to be a six month internship, then that’s what it’s going to be. If it’s going to be a four month, three months, a one year, that’s what it’s going to be.
Emeka: So you guys are going to be working in partnership with schools?
Dolapo: Yes. Obviously. You can’t even do anything. You can’t just take some student out of your schools without the school.
Emeka: That’s good stuff. So we cannot discuss Internet accessibility without the issue of concern on cyber security.
Dolapo: Very seriously.
Emeka: Okay, so what are some of the potential risks associated with increasing internet accessibility in that respect? And how can they be mitigated?
Dolapo: Okay, so we actually have a cyber-attack, the more people and devices before you.
Emeka: Take that, can you just explain cyber-attack a little bit so people can just understand the intensity of this?
Dolapo: Okay, so it’s just like the name, let me just put it in the simple in the layman’s term, please do so. It’s just what it says, cyber, the internet. Like even those days when you say you’re going to the cyber cafe, everybody knows what you want to go and access to the internet. So it’s like saying you’re attacking, you’re sending something that would disrupt the stability of the internet itself. So there are different ways in which that is done, you understand? So in a layman’s term, it’s just like saying, okay, you go into the internet for the purpose of causing harm to a particular thing. It can be thin individual information or whatever it is. So it’s just that you’re attacking the cyber generally.
So when I say cyber-attack, the more people and devices that have access to the internet, the higher the risk of cyber-attack. And some of these things we have are fishing malware and ransom ware attacks. And that’s just what I explained. The moment you send what is ample to the internet, sometimes they will tell you see an email that will pop up or click on and sometimes I just even wonder what’s going on because you probably didn’t even access that site and then it’s popping up and then we still go ahead and press it because the information has to look like very original, like he has to look so real that I’m tempting that we’re like, no, this one, I go press some. So, you go ahead and press it and then just find out that someone just statement and say, oh, your information has been your system has been hacked. Some requests for money to be able to release such to you. So that’s one thing about cyber-attack. We have a data breach, that’s breach of information. So more accessibility increases the amount of data being shared, which increases the risk of data breaches and loss of sensitive information. So the more and more we have people accessing the Internet, the more we share data. That is what we do with the internet majorly sharing of data. So because of that, it increases the risk of data breaches. Anyone can just go, there’s a breach of data like, Oh, I have access to what I’m not supposed to have access to.
Emeka: And you use your information for other things.
Dolapo: Yes. And thank you for saying that because that brings me to identity theft. So the more information to share online, the risk of identity theft where personal info is used for malicious act to impersonate and commit fraud. I’m sure we’ve heard of it over time. You just find out that someone has stolen your identity and is asking people on your contacts for money, or they are asking people on your contact for information about you. We’ve seen a lot on social media, and I think quite a lot even happened last year that I read about. This is just what Identity theft does. To mitigate this issues we have, one of the things we can do is to use very strong passwords and two factor authentication. So not just have your strong password, ensure you’re running this two side by side with your two factor authentication. Then keep our software and systems updated with the latest security patches. So when your system tells you to update your security, some of us actually ignore this thing. Ignore it. When you see them, you just ignore it.
Emeka: That same thing happened to me this morning in the office.
Dolapo: I’m glad you’re a witness to what is. You have to keep your software updated. Once the new version has come out, try and update it because once it’s obsolete, it becomes an issue. It’s porous, you understand. Then use a VPN. That’s a virtual private network when accessing the Internet. I’m sure most of us might know what a VPN is because this even went into… It was a big thing when Twitter was shut down, and a lot of people had to bypass using the VPN and all of that. So use a VPN when you need to access the Internet, then regularly back up your important data and use encryption when sending sensitive information. It’s important to back up your data. And when I mentioned that in security thing, the ability for the intelligence agencies to use this information, I made mention of encrypting data because it can be stolen. So encrypting data is saying, like securing your data in such a way that anybody… The other person cannot understand what it is. They can’t. And finally, you can use reliable anti malware software to protect against cyber threats. Have these entire antiviruses and anti-malware software in your system so that once you get such attacks, you’re getting the notice you know how to handle that.
Emeka: Thank you very much, Dolapo. We hope that this discussion has been a very engaging and enlightening one for you. Thank you Dolapo for coming on the show today. And we do hope that you have a very lovely weekend. Thank you. So until next weekend..Okay, let’s just exercise our civic rights and go to the polls and also elect our governor for Lagos State. So let’s continue to be a light to one another. The show is brought to you by CSR-in-Action, proudly sponsored by Act Foundation. And I remain Emeka Aaron your number one celebrity show host. Please exercise your civic duty like I said and go out there to vote. Until next time, stay safe.
