 Glad to know you're still there. Tracking device shortage hindering police probes into kidnapping epidemic. That is what is being said by security experts. We're being joined now by Dominic Rume or Ririye, certified blockchain architect and Metaverse experts. Good morning and welcome to the program Rume. That feels so weird when you say that. I'm not feeling weird. Yeah, Rume. It's not sitting here with me though. Welcome Rume. Yeah, thank you for having me. Thank you for joining us. Okay, let me start. Let me just cool down and ask this question. Gadgets are not available and that's why the tracking is difficult now. I don't know. Is this really a thing? Should this be a thing for the security experts or security agencies? Is this a good enough excuse? Let's start from there. Well, there are countries that have successfully used technology to enhance their security measures. Like for instance, border security agencies worldwide have been using technologies like biometric identification and intelligence to truly revolutionize border surveillance. And you see, these technologies have truly been instrumental in preventing unauthorized immigration. Now, some of the things that happen with drug trafficking and terrorism, you see, sometimes we try to attribute it to a particular sector of the country where the border is very porous. Now, we can see that if we have technologies like this to help in identity verification, we can help the police to be able to cover one or two situations that happen, especially with these illegal immigrants. So they are not far from the truth. I want you to look at this. The trauma that this type of kidnapping, the mental health trauma, I have a professor friend, one that is from the University of Lagos, and I experienced this kidnapping in a certain time. Today is an advocate for mental health because he had to go through that route to be able to recover. So it's something that, yes, we needed a couple of these advanced technology infrastructures to be able to aid and collaborate with our security forces to help drive home security as we wanted. Yeah, the reason I asked the question is not really that I do not think that technology is good enough, but the fact that security gets the highest budget, year in, year out, and then they're still telling us that the lack of these gadgets is causing XYZ. Now, as someone who knows about these things, do you think it is so difficult to obtain these things that they need to be able to track these criminals and bring them to justice, knowing the kind of budget that goes to security every year? Well, in terms of defining if it's difficult or not, we may not be in the best position to put that because, I mean, we're not part of the different departments that are getting the same. The thing that I understand for sure is that the cost of acquiring these tools can be very daunting, and it depends on the specific requirement of the organization. You can imagine, yesterday I was looking at the situation where maybe you want to acquire like, you just manage a country like Dubai now, for example. You acquire those types of surveillance cameras, and let's say, imagine you want to put that in Potter Cots, something, those types of surveillance cameras in Potter Cots, you will be able to call one or two of these incidents. You'll see that it's very expensive. Now, manpower to also be able to do that might become an issue. But data sharing, to be able to see that those things work in real time, well, maybe we need to move to IPFS, Interplanetary Fire System method of sharing. So the cost is actually great. I was probably going to look at the requirements for every security infrastructure that has to be put together. But that's not to say that we have not deployed quite enough money to be able to get us to a considerable extent at this point in time. So I think we should leave the excuses behind and take the actions to truly get us to where we need to get to. So what are those actions that you think can take us to where we need to get to? Because, like we said, security takes a huge chunk of the budget. And another thing, the police people talked about using the resources from the DSS. Shouldn't they have their own? Or is there a way they can collaborate? I'm sure they do that right now, but with the information, they give information willingly. Okay, some of the actions will revolve around education of better and also allowing private institutions to collaborate with governments. Because some of these private institutions will be able to get in some of these infrastructures. And maybe they can now collaborate with them. I've had a situation where you want to do tracking. And then the police will tell you that they cannot do that particular tracking. They want to maybe use DSS tools for that. You see, these kind of things will not be happening if there is actually a plethora of those tools around. Like you have a multitude of different agencies that have access to those type of tools. I mean, you don't need to go to the DSS. They can just contact the private institution. So that means that it will be faster. And then the documentation process that I mean, they might need to scale through will be less. So which means you will get real-time feedback for this case you are trying to tackle. So these things are significant measures that can be taken to enhance that security. Especially if you want to use the local laws and regulations to... Well, you can start from those two bedrocks. How about giving the private institution a lot of chance and then much more education in their life to see that we can even develop the manpower that's necessary. Yeah, but what gives us concern is whether it's true that it's a product of the lack of the gadgets or the product of the lack of the wheel to do the job they are supposed to do. Because whether they are gadgets or not, if they are not willing to do the job, they will not do it. Let me give you some instance. Someone withdraws your money from the bank. You go to the bank. They know how to trace where the money went to but they will not do it. You report to the police that someone has snatched your bag and they are telling you to fuel their car before they can move. That's not a product of saying the car is not available. They just want to frustrate you. You have to fund your own investigation. So is it really because there is no funds or there are no gadgets or something that... Do you believe this is really something that they should be talking about now or that they don't have the will to do what they're supposed to do? You know, two things where I was really... I completed a course on limiting how to become an ally. And it says to be able to check your route course of every problem before you jump into that conclusion. And when you look at the situation that you have truly painted, there is a lot of truth in it. You also need to ask why this has become the case or this is the issue. I think it might have happened for some cases and it can't really generalize it to the general, the Nebrian police force because for what I also understand, they are telling you they have done very well and they didn't really receive the best prison and college for it. However, the excuse for them to ever not be 100% up and doing... especially when it comes to security and protection of life and properties or giving excuses for infrastructure gap. But I must tell you, when there's a will, there's a way. Why is that? When there's a will, there's a way. Why will the policeman be trying to drag his foot back when there's an organ on top that has given the instruction for them to go? Then something is happening too at the head of that particular unit or station that is not right. So I want to say it is a combination of both. There's a combination of having the officer that might not be with him. Some of them too. You might see it's also a combination of having a lack of infrastructure. I mean, for example, a soldier is only as good as how well you train him to use the gun in front of a battlefield. So you might have a situation that calls for the police attention and the people that they want to go and fight or they want to go and destroy have better equipment or better infrastructure than them. Some of them might get scared as the human factor may kick in and they will not want to show their bravery anymore because of lack of infrastructure and then they are seeing that the odds against them. So these are real problems that have actually ensued in this sector. So we must do everything to look at it and say, okay, this might have happened because of these reasons. Let's be able to empower them better in this space and then now hold them accountable. If something like that happens, you should report them to a civil authority. You should report the police people to be able to see that these things never repeat themselves again. Every Nigerian do not take that type of nonchalantness from the security authorities. They are there to be able to protect the lives and property of every Nigerian regardless of what it is. As far as you have fulfilled your part of this, what is required of the citizens to do to get them into your situation, then anything that happened that does not follow actions of movement to be able to rescue and save lives and property, you have the right to report them to higher authorities. My concern is when they get these devices, how sure are we that they are going to even be trained to use them according to how they are supposed to be used. Or they will accept to even use them. Yes, how they are going to utilize them and then if they are going to even use them at all. Because we have seen cases whereby they give them these resources and they don't care. They don't do anything to protect the Nigerian lives and properties, like you just said. So how sure are we that when they get this, it is not just a way to siphon money, one, because they might just say, oh, this is how much we need for this and maybe that's not the amount. So a way to just embezzle funds and then if they truly get these gadgets that they are talking about, how sure are we that they are going to utilize them as well? Well, it's going back to that key point that I made, that a soldier that you put in the war front is only as good as to the level of training you have given to him or to use the equipment that you have given to that soldier to defend you in the war front. We can only be sure where we have truly applied efforts from our end. You know, there's a populace in their lives that doesn't really give you what you want, it gives you what you take away from it. So having provided this infrastructure, we must take something away from the roadmap that we must have designed for our security and how we will do that. We ensure that we have provided this. There is also adequate required training for these new guys that will be required to operate it. Every human being is excited to explore when you have people who really come from the different departments that want to learn how to use these equipment that have just been bought. I mean, those people will definitely come on board to be able to take on any challenge in real time. So it must come first that we take responsibility to actually train them and then assign them to maybe special units. I can know that they have special units for different things. Maybe we will differentiate some of them in terms of what their job specification will not be so that we can always hold those set of people accountable for this. I'm very positive that if training is given to the Nigerian police they will always deliver on their duties. The problem is, I think they will get the training but I think the training may not be sufficient. Psychological training and so on may not be as much as the physical training they are giving to them because when you talk about training and the person or a soldier being as good as the weapon before them the Nigerian police people who are handling the guns I'm sure they know how to shoot it but we also have information from people who are being kidnapped and the kidnappers that are being also captured as well telling us that sometimes even these policemen use the guns that government has given to them to rent to kidnappers and make returns from these guns. No matter how we want to write off that, we cannot because this is something that so many testimonies have come that happened. So will they, like it goes back to the question will they even use it the way they are supposed to use it? Now they are complaining that it's because these things are not available. What about the ones that are available? How are they using it? How do you utilise it? The thing of trust is one of the biggest issues of man and that's why technologies like blockchain technology to be able to help with transparency and to be able to help with accountability is there too. Now you are not far from the truth human beings can be compromised at any point in time giving some incentives like money maybe if a loved one is also under threat it might be a reason for them to compromise their stand. However, we must now fall back to I think when these guys take their oath they have the oath to be able to protect lives of property no matter what and if you sell your soul in Africa we believe that if you sell your soul for money or you sell your integrity for just money then you really have nothing else to be living for if you give it out for just money money shouldn't be everything. So as Africans, I believe we as Nigerians we've also problem over the last years and even in the last recent march that were the clients of Africa we exude this level of self-discipline this level of integrity it's something that must not come from the staff I mean you see the average US police he will not really compromise on a lot of things you see the average US soldier Dubai police they won't compromise on a lot of things so let's look at the framework, how has this successful country done it what did they really do for their police that is making their police not to be able to compromise can we start implementing same I know they've actually increased the salaries of police in recent time to be able to see that one or two things like maybe money does not really become an issue that will make them compromise their stand but we need to also do much more than that maybe assisting them to diffuse some of those extra costs that comes with family because it's currently a very wild west out there especially with the bills and might make some of these officers compromise however I think if we take a look at if you just like you have a security man that you have had in your in your gates for the last 10 years you are paying 15,000 there for 10 years one day people might maybe come to me that security man and give him one million I have never given him that and you will give them access into your house so you need to always also check who is at the gate check your guard at the top and then use that process to be able to connect the gap of what is making these guys to compromise their stand easily okay as we wind up now I just want to get your suggestion since you said that it might be a very difficult thing to get these gadgets because the cost might be overwhelming they should be some that we can start with I mean in a country that some senators can buy 160 something we shouldn't find it so difficult to buy gadgets that will protect the people because if we are not protected no matter what you're driving even if it costs a billion you will not be safe driving it so what are the basic ones that you think we should acquire as a nation that can help us to be more security efficient if I may use the word you coming in with your question where do we start what kind of gadgets do you think we need at least to begin with everything that we want because the cost might be overwhelming so which are the ones that you would recommend if you were asked I mean the four starters the basic the basic thing that builds every economy every organization communication high level of communication for starters the police can't stand by having good communication system you know you find out that some of them they can also start by having smart cameras too like some of them they are unable to communicate very well you see them on the road shouting hey hey they are trying to communicate with somebody and you see maybe in the real time before they can't communicate effectively to the other guy it becomes the problem so they can start from smart communicators they can also these are easy they can also start from smart camera apps they can also start from having I think they can do better weapons right they can also you see some policemen the gun that they are using some of our farmers some of those type of guns so we can start also investing into their weaponry as well because I mean it just like iPhone and Android if you hold them good iPhone 15 you'll be happy to test the features on all of these when you are holding in a KRC something in this world to bring it out to test the features might not be exciting to you so we must also upgrade in that aspect and I think with these basic upgrades we can start we need a lot of I think they also need a lot of computers and also the basic training to be able to I mean for example now I've had experience in that we need something called transaction traceability training for the security system in general traceability like now we have this situation where we deal with digital currencies the cyber crime, the cyber fraud some of this I mean some of these kidnappers they use online passwords and means of obtaining information to be able to get across to these people so we see that cyber security is also a place that the police must invest some level of tech skills to be able to get those IP addresses maybe they even use money fraud to do one or two things now I have seen a blockchain situation where the whole department especially the department that was in charge of it nobody knew how to trace transaction as a certified blockchain architect I had to come in bring in one or two of my colleagues before we were able to do a forensic traceability report for the police now just imagine we had four or five people that were like me or had the skillset that I have in just that police department it would have been easy for them to be able to do that so they need skillset to trace transaction in this modern world there is no skillset for transaction traceability and I mean that one of the biggest cases that fraud happens kidnapping new passes through in this country so that skillset is very very necessary for the police right now alright thank you Rume for your insight to this and it was a pleasure having you on the show thank you so much I am grateful thank you for having me yeah that was Rume that was another Rume Dominique Rume Aurilier is a certified blockchain architect and meta-based expert the complain has been from the security architecture that we have the tracking device shortages the one that is hindering police probes into kidnapping epidemic okay well we do hope that whatever the needs are would be satisfied and would be safe and we can sleep with our both eyes yes that's the prayer eventually this is where we are happy yes this is the size of our show we thank you so much for being a part of it we are inviting you back for tomorrow my name is Nyam Goong my name is Rume Foulson have an amazing day