(Seychelles News Agency) - The setting up of a cybercrime unit in Seychelles was the subject of discussions held from Wednesday to Friday between the Seychelles Police Force and a delegation from Interpol.

The head of Detective Services in Seychelles, Superintendent Jeffery Antoine, said that such a unit is necessary to deal with the alarming number of cases where people have been duped and scammed out of large sums of money online.

He said that the police have also received cases where children have been the target on social media.

“We have noticed a marked increase in the number of cases relating to cybercrime being reported, and this is why we have decided to implement this idea. We reached out to Interpol and they were ready to step in and help the Seychelles Police Force with the know-how on how to go about this,” said Antoine. 

Interpol delegates, police officers, bankers and ICT specialists listen to a cybercrime presentation (Seychelles Police) Photo License: CC-BY

The superintendent said that initiative is a result of the Cybercrime Act 2021.

The delegation of Interpol - the International Criminal Police Organisation - was headed by the assistant director of the Cybercrime Directorate, Jacqueline De Lange, who emphasised the importance of countries working together with the organisation.

She said that most of the time, women and children are the main victims of cybercrime and that this is one of the main reasons why Interpol is implementing awareness campaigns.

“Interpol is in a very unique position because we are connected globally to 195 member countries where we are neutral. We have access to the necessary tools, systems, and databases to support our member countries. It’s important to share information and establish a trusting working relationship as we have done here in Seychelles in the past three days,” she said.

Lange added that “it’s important for us that Seychelles has enacted the new Cybercrimes Act 2021, that will definitely help the Seychelles Police in setting up the cybercrime unit and establishing a cybercrime strategy.”

Superintendent Antoine hopes that Seychelles, an archipelago in the western Indian Ocean, will continue to Interpol’s help for the creation of a cybercrime unit mainly with training.

“We already have several of our officers who are training with Interpol for other topics. This visit in a way formalises this relationship. They have also given us information about where to source the necessary equipment to start our unit,” he added.

The new unit will focus mainly on cybercrime and will enable the police force to better allocate resources in order to deal with such cases.

“The Seychelles Police Force already has several units that deal with certain cases that can also be linked to cybercrime, for example, the Commercial Crimes Unit, CID, Family Squad. This new unit will focus primarily on cybercrime,” said Antoine.

He said that after the three-day discussions “we will work on the framework first in order to identify what is needed especially in regard to human resources. We will need people who specialise in these sorts of cases.”