Get Guardian on GoogleA growing network of transnational cybercrime syndicates is exploiting youth unemployment in Africa to recruit thousands of young people into organised online fraud operations, with some allegedly subjected to forced labour and restrictions on their freedom, a cybersecurity expert, Oluwatobi Ayodele, has warned.
Ayodele said the emerging trend, which he described as cyber slavery, was transforming cybercrime from largely individual online scams into industrialised criminal operations, raising concerns about the continent’s vulnerability to international trafficking networks.
Speaking at the 16th Octopus Conference on Cybercrime in Strasbourg, France, he said criminal syndicates were increasingly relocating operations from Southeast Asia to African countries, disguising recruitment drives as legitimate employment opportunities in call centres and technology support companies.
He cited estimates by the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime suggesting that about 15,000 young Africans from 33 countries had been lured into such facilities, where they were subsequently drawn into organised online scams.
According to him, many victims initially accept the offers believing they have secured legitimate digital employment but later discover that they have been recruited into criminal enterprises where their movement and freedom are restricted.
The development, he said, was being compounded by artificial intelligence (AI), which has lowered the technical barriers to cybercrime through deepfakes, automated tools and other technologies that make sophisticated fraud easier to execute.
Ayodele, who delivered a presentation titled, ‘Beyond Yahoo Yahoo: AI, Cyber Slavery, and the Industrialization of Cybercrime in Africa’, warned that the threat extended beyond the conventional image of young Nigerians engaging in romance scams and internet fraud.
He cited reported arrests of foreign nationals in Nigeria, including more than 300 operators from countries such as China, the Philippines and Brazil since 2024, as well as the arrest of 169 foreign nationals in Uganda. He also referenced the dismantling of similar networks in Angola and Zambia.
The cybersecurity expert further pointed to a warning by the Chinese Embassy in Madagascar over forced labour associated with online scam operations, describing the development as evidence of the expanding reach of transnational cybercrime networks.
He warned that the availability of vulnerable young people seeking employment made African countries attractive destinations for syndicates seeking to establish or expand their operations.
Reflecting on the 25th anniversary of the Budapest Convention on Cybercrime, Ayodele said international legal frameworks remained important for investigating and prosecuting offenders but were insufficient to address the social and economic conditions enabling the networks to thrive.
He called for governments to invest more in legitimate digital employment opportunities and strengthen preventive measures to protect unemployed youths from fraudulent recruitment schemes. He also advocated coordinated international action, arguing that cybercrime networks and their methods were no longer restricted by national borders.
The 16th Octopus Conference, organised by the Council of Europe’s Cybercrime Programme Office, brought together nearly 500 participants from 106 countries in Strasbourg, with additional participants joining online. The gathering examined international cooperation against cybercrime and marked 25 years of the Budapest Convention, a major international framework for combating cybercrime.
