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Nigeria’s e-security has been ranked among the top 50 worldwide, better than any other African country according to a report.
South Africa, well-known for its digital infrastructure was ranked 85th on e-security in the 2021 Digital Quality of Life (DQL) report.
However, “among countries in Africa, people in South Africa enjoy the highest quality of their digital lives”.
According to the report compiled by Surfshark, a cybersecurity company, the e-security ranking takes into consideration two major factors ― cybersecurity and data protection laws.
On cybersecurity, Nigeria ranks 48th globally with high data protection laws, according to the report.
“Nigeria’s digital quality of life remains similar to last year’s. Despite the slight fall in the leaderboard, the country comes first in Western Africa and shows slightly better results in some pillars than the global average.
“Its e-security is among the TOP 50 worldwide, surpassing Africa’s DQL leader South Africa,” the report reads.
Nigeria’s internet affordability
However, the internet affordability in Nigeria, the self-acclaimed African giant, is a sorry story.
“The study shows that Nigeria’s internet affordability is 90% worse than the global average.
“People in Nigeria have to work the most time in the world – more than 35 hours – to afford the cheapest broadband internet.
“The world’s worst internet is the least affordable”.
For a layman, broadband is simply the measurement of how much data your device can exchange with another device through the internet. It is measured in Megabits per second (Mbps).
How quick this technology is able to do it is what is referred to as the broadband speed, remember a popular sentence by Nigerians “my internet is slow”.
The higher the speed of your broadband internet, the higher it is likely to cost.
Users with a higher broadband internet speed might be able to download a 1GB file (such as movies) in few minutes while you might do the same in close to an hour ― blame your internet speed.
Difference between Megabits (Mbps) and Megabytes (MBps)
Mbps (Megabits per second) should not be confused with MBps which simply interprets Megabytes per second. The MBps is used to measure file transfer such as when you are downloading or uploading a file.
One Megabyte is equivalent to 8 Megabits (1 MBps = 8 Mbps).
Nigeria’s e-government
Also, the DQL report noted that the e-government in Nigeria ranks below the top 90 “falling behind Morocco, Senegal and Tanzania”, and also Egypt, Ghana and South Africa.
The e-government considers the nation’s proficiency in Online Service and readiness to deploy or incorporate Artificial Intelligence (AI).
Nigeria ranks 94th in online service proficiency and 104th in AI readiness. This may be improved with better internet affordability which could increase internet usage in the country.
“Internet use drives e-government development more than the wealth of a country. 23 out of 58 countries with a higher than average e-government rate have lower than average GDP per capita. Yet, the nationwide internet use in these countries is over 75%.”
Nigeria’s broadband connection speed
Unfortunately, Nigeria “has one of the slowest broadband connection speeds globally (13.45 Mbps), ranking 105th, and slightly faster mobile internet (17.91 Mbps), ranking 96th.
“However, the country’s broadband speed growth is one of the fastest on the planet, ranking 16th.
“But Nigeria’s internet quality is similar to the global average, and its broadband speed growth is one of the fastest on the planet – ranks 16th worldwide”.
AI readiness according to the report enhances protection against cyber threats the most.
“18 out of the top 20 countries with the highest readiness to adopt AI technology are prepared to counter cyber threats the most. The two exceptions here are China and the United Arab Emirates,” the report noted.
However, Nigeria’s investment in electronic infrastructure was ranked poor. It is the 6th in Africa, below Kenya and Morocco.
The electronic infrastructure ranking considers Individuals using the internet (rank/100 inhabitants) and Network readiness. Nigeria ranks 69th based on individuals using the internet and 106th in Network readiness.
To better understand this concept, Network Readiness measures the propensity for countries to exploit the opportunities offered by information and communications technology (ICT).
The World Economic Forum’s Networked Readiness Index (NRI) in 2020 ranked Nigeria 117th, below countries like Zambia, Cote D’Ivoire and the Benin Republic. In fact, the ranking was below low-income countries like Uganda and Rwanda.
The 2021 DQL research examined a total population of more than 6.9 billion people across 110 countries globally.
The study is based on open-source information provided by the United Nations, the World Bank, Freedom House, the International Communications Union, and other sources.
Nigeria ranked 82nd in the DQL list globally (of 110 countries) and 5th in Africa (out of 18 countries).
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