Cybersecurity

West African scammers targeted by agencies and companies

West African scammers targeted by agencies and companies

Almost 30 suspected scammers have been arrested and 3.7 million online profiles and accounts removed as part of a multi-agency crackdown – also involving private sector companies – against fraud perpetrated from across Africa.

The arrests, which took place in recent weeks, primarily in Ghana and Nigeria, happened as more than 100 people from overseas law enforcement agencies and tech companies gathered in London to participate in an operational intensification targeting crime groups operating across Africa and the infrastructure that they use to target victims in the UK and beyond.

Officers from such organisations as the FBI, Nigeria Police Force and Ghanaian Cyber Security Authority were joined by industry representatives from 15 companies including Meta, Microsoft and Google.

According to the UK's National Crime Agency (NCA), which hosted the event between 6 and 9 October, operational activity took place both during that week and in the run-up to the event. The operations included focus on fraudsters based in West African countries, including Ghana and Nigeria, where social media profiles are used to target victims of a number of fraud types, including investment and impersonation fraud.

Report Fraud, a UK service that enables people to tell the police about cybercrime and fraud, worked with tech giant Meta to provide data to identify fraud enablers. The NCA and other law enforcement agencies worked closely with industry to help locate the suspects behind the scams leading to their arrests. Meta also played a key role in coordinating the event and encouraging broad private sector participation to maximise scam compound disruption.

Over 1,110 West African Facebook and Instagram accounts that were associated with the data provided by Report Fraud were disabled, as were over 490 Facebook accounts and over 490 ad accounts identified by the UK’s OCC (Office of the Comptroller of the Currency) Data Enforcement. OCC Data Domain Enforcement identified and disabled over 380 scam domains that were assessed to potentially be associated with the scam domains provided by the OCC.

Arrests and seizure of associated electronic devices took place in the Sasaabi, Accra region of Ghana and the Delta State in Nigeria. This was a multi-agency operation led by the Ghana Cyber Security Authority, supported by the NCA, Ghana Police Service, FBI, and the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission in Nigeria.

The crackdown also saw 3.7 million online profiles and accounts removed by Meta and a total of $11 million dollars in potential freezable funds were identified by the private sector partners.

Will it be enough? As Ecofin notes, in its cyberthreat assessment published in June 2025, Interpol reported that more than 30% of crimes reported in West and East Africa were linked to cybercrime, based on data provided by the countries surveyed. However, in its African Cyberthreat Assessment Report 2026, Interpol recommends strengthening digital investigation capabilities, cross-border cooperation and partnerships between law enforcement agencies and private companies, so this initiative seems to be a timely one.



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