Government is looking into ways of protecting citizens from cyber-attacks through the enactment of cyber laws, Minister of Information Communication and Technology, Postal and Courier Services, Supa Mandiwanzira has said.
Speaking at Cyber Security workshop organized by the Zimbabwe Information and Communication Technologies Division, (ZICT), Mandiwanzira said there is need to implement cyber laws to reduce threats of attack on people’s information.
“Computer crime and cyber crime bill needs to move fast so that we implement these laws because threats of attack are very high.
“Cyber-attack demonstrates why we really need to have laws as soon as possible because we are doing to protect our information, our personal details,” he said.
Mandiwanzira dismissed allegations of government wanting to control or limit citizen access to social media saying cyber laws are for good intentions including protecting personal information of people from computer hackers.
“When we talked about having cyber laws, people criticized me and said that the government is on it again but it was for the good of everyone, people have a tendency of not trusting the government,” said Mandiwanzira.
Minister Mandiwanzira added that the current mobile penetration figures illustrates how people are at risk from cyber criminals.
“Mobile penetration is at more than 100%, active mobile is at 95% which means that adoption of technology is very high and for that people need to understand the danger of being online, giving us more reasons for cyber laws,” Mandiwanzira said.
Former United Kingdom Prime Minister, David Cameron once suggested a ban on chat apps following a 2008 Mumbai terrorist attacks, after which the Indian government made demands to Gmail, Skype and Blackberry to share encryption keys that could help India monitor communication among users for the sake of intercepting potential terrorist activities.
United Arab Emirates, China and United States have made agreements with internet companies to assist them with information that could help detect potential terrorist activities.
