Reducing Cyber Crime in Africa through Education

Technology needs and uses are expanding in Africa. Cybersecurity challenges faced daily are: child pornography, stolen money, data breaches, denial of service, online extortion, cred-it-card fraud, identify theft, network takeovers via botnets, fake news and emails, ransomware, and more. Since the Internet is ubiquitous, any security improvement in one location benefits all. This paper postulates that such security achievements can be attained through high-quality engineering education in cybersecurity. ABET is the recognized world leader in accrediting programmes in engineering and computing. In their 2022–23 Criteria for Accrediting Computing Programs, ABET published criteria for accrediting two-year programmes in cybersecurity. The novel research question we examine is what it would take to spawn an ABET-accreditable, two-year degree in cybersecurity from a typical African Bachelor of Science in Computer Science. As experts with a combined $\mathbf{35+}$ years' experience with ABET accreditation, we use a systematic methodology to evaluate and analyse a programme in a de-tailed, step-by-step, easy-to-understand manner and show exactly what needs to be done to build a two-year cybersecurity programme. Our approach is straightforward, comprehensive, and replicable. Two-year programmes are a step toward developing a cybersecurity workforce in Africa, where there are few programmes dedicated to cybersecurity. It is our hope that this work inspires and shows educational institutions a way to spawn two-year programmes in cybersecurity from their existing programmes. The rationale and significance of this work is that it leads the way to develop educational pro-grammes in cybersecurity in Africa. The cadre of workers that could be added to Africa's workforce from this research is relevant and critical to Africa's development and online security. Without having the personnel and tools to fight cyber-crime properly, the continent falls behind on the international stage and is unable to compete successfully for international businesses. News reports of increasing incidents of cyber-crimes originating from particular regions and countries, badly damage their reputations as locations for healthy places to conduct business. This work combats cybercrime through engineering education.