Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has shut down over 800 scam websites and arrested members of 18 syndicates behind the fraudulent schemes in its renewed bid to deal decisively with internet fraudsters.

The operation was carried out through an EFCC initiative, tagged “Project Eagle Claw,” a statement by the commission’s Head, Media and Publicity, Femi Babafemi, said on Thursday.

According to the statement, EFCC Chairman, Farida Waziri, disclosed this in Las Vegas, United States of America, on Wednesday while addressing a gathering of U.S. mayors at the 35th Annual Convention of Black Mayors.

The theme of the convention was “global vision for local action: a paradigm of connectivity in the African Diaspora”.

The statement quoted Waziri as saying: “We expect that Eagle Claw as conceived will be 100 per cent operational within six months and at full capacity, it will take Nigeria out of the top 10 list of countries with the highest incidence of fraudulent e-mails”.

She said at the moment, Eagle Claw has delivered the following results:

“Over 800 fraudulent e-mail addresses have been identified and shut down.

“The EFCC is fine tuning security modalities with Microsoft and upon full deployment, the capacity to take down fraudulent e-mails will increase to 5,000 monthly.”

“Further, it is projected that advisory mails to be sent to victims and potential victims will be about 230,000 monthly.

“There have been 18 arrests of high profile syndicates operating cyber crime organisations.”

While justifying her decision to adopt the latest strategy against cyber crime, Waziri said “Project Eagle Claw is an initiative of the EFCC for the smart use of technology in fighting cyber crime.

“Hitherto the EFCC structure for combating cyber crime revolved around cyber raids and investigation of petitions.

“However the proactive stance of the new leadership required a radical departure and Eagle Claw was developed,” she added.

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