Kenya: ISPs sound alarm over cyber crooks

"Some crooks register domains very similar to existing entities and try to target customers of the entity with a view to getting information and using the information for fraudulent purposes. Specifically, banking details have been obtained from customers and used to steal money from the customers. This is on the increase and it is time we delt with it as a country," says Omariba.

To conuter the growing cases of cybercrime, internet service providers (ISPs) have come up with mechanism to detect fraud, with interventions varying per customer and depending on the level of controls ISPs have over the customers' systems. "However, in the event a fraud, there exists an arrangement where a domain name can be disabled at international level if the aggrieved party seeks proper intervention and shows evidence that their domain is being used for abuse."

Omariba says Kenya needs to get to a level where the registration of domain names is properly vetted so that the country has the right entities registering the right domains.

Kenya's domain names are registered by the Kenya Network Information Centre (KENIC). As an owner of the domain names, it can vet the domain names for cases of abuse and deregister them.