Abuja — December 4, 2025 | Dalena Reporters
Nigeria has emerged as the most targeted nation in Africa for weekly cyberattacks, according to the newly released 2025 African Perspectives on Cyber Security report by Check Point Software Technologies. The report reveals that Nigerian organisations now face an average of 4,200 cyberattacks per organisation every week, surpassing all other countries on the continent and registering figures more than 60% higher than the global average.
This alarming spike highlights a rapidly deteriorating cybersecurity environment fuelled by growing digital adoption, increased cloud dependence, and the rising use of advanced AI-driven techniques by cybercriminals. Analysts warn that Nigeria’s cyber-risk exposure is now among the highest in the world, leaving critical sectors — including finance, telecommunications, government, energy, and public-service infrastructure — extremely vulnerable.
The report notes that cybercriminals are increasingly exploiting identity-based weaknesses, cloud misconfigurations, and sophisticated phishing attacks powered by artificial intelligence. These methods enable attackers to target thousands of organisations simultaneously, bypass traditional security measures, and compromise sensitive systems within minutes.
Earlier in 2025, Nigerian organisations recorded even higher numbers, with some periods registering over 6,100 weekly attacks per organisation, representing one of the sharpest year-on-year surges ever documented for any African country. Experts caution that even a tiny success rate by attackers — less than 1% — could result in catastrophic breaches, massive financial losses, and nationwide disruptions.
Cybersecurity specialists attribute Nigeria’s vulnerability to the combination of rapid digital transformation and slow adoption of modern security frameworks. With businesses, government agencies, and service providers migrating to cloud platforms at an accelerating pace, many have failed to establish strong identity-access controls, leaving digital systems exposed to aggressive exploitation.
The Check Point report calls for a prevention-first national strategy, recommending stronger identity-verification systems, AI-based threat-detection tools, regular cloud-security audits, mandatory cybersecurity standards for organisations, and continuous training to address human-error vulnerabilities. Analysts argue that without immediate intervention, Nigeria risks facing a systemic digital-security crisis that could undermine economic growth, compromise national infrastructure, and erode public trust in digital services.
By Dalena Reporters — Cybersecurity & Technology Desk