MDAs Must Migrate Websites To .Gov.Ng - NITDA

National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) said it has observed the disregard to the use of .gov.ng domain in the transaction of government business despite previous press statements by the agency.

According to the Agency, it will henceforth ensure strict compliance with the directive by ensuring that all government business transactions are strictly carried out on the Country Code Top Level Domain of the Nigerian government (ccTLD.ng).

A statement signed by Dr Isa Ali Ibrahim Pantami, director general/CEO of NITDA, the Agency, he said, has put measures in place to ensure that all government MDAs (Federal, State, and Local Government) operate within the .gov.ng.

Part of the These measures, Dr. Pantami said, include:

1. Ensuring that all request for .gov.ng domain are verified and approved within 24hours provided all conditions are met. (For details, see http://nitda.gov.ng/procedure-for-gov-ng-domain-registration/);
2. Provision of a Special Purpose 24/7 mobile phone number (+2348140504418) for responses to enquiries and technical support;

iii.        Regular evaluation of government websites in collaboration with relevant agencies of the government; and

1. Blacklisting of all MDA sites running on Generic Top Level Domain (gTLD), other than the .gov.ng.

“For the avoidance of doubt, the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) is an Agency of the Nigerian Government tasked with the implementation of the Nigerian Information Technology Policy and co-ordination of general IT development and regulation in the country.

“Section 6(l) of the NITDA Act mandates that NITDA renders advisory services in all Information Technology matters to the public and private sectors. NITDA is also mandated “To ensure Internet governance and supervision of the management of the country code top-level domain (cctld.ng) on behalf of all Nigerians.”

“Furthermore, .gov.ng domain names are free with no rental or renewal cost attached. We therefore call on MDAs and service providers to support the Federal Government effort of moving Nigeria up on the scale of ‘ease of doing business’ by ensuring that all government websites are ONLY hosted on the .gov.ng as this will promote Government service delivery in Nigeria”, he said

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App Developers with Apache® Spark™ to benefit more as Microsoft Unveils New Opportunities

At Connect(); 2017, Microsoft Corp.’s annual event for professional developers, Scott Guthrie, executive vice president, announced new Microsoft data platform technologies and cross-platform developer tools.

Guthrie outlined the company’s vision for what’s next for developers across a broad range of Microsoft and open source technologies, and how Microsoft is helping them get more done across any app or platform.

He also touched on key application scenarios and ways developers can use built-in artificial intelligence (AI)to support continuous innovation and continuous deployment of today’s intelligent applications.

“With today’s intelligent cloud, emerging technologies like AI have the potential to change every facet of how we interact with the world,” said Guthrie. “Developers are in the forefront of shaping that potential. Today we’re announcing new tools and services that help developers build applications and services for the AI-driven future, using the platforms, languages, and collaboration tools they already know and love.”

Any dev, any app, any data, any platform

Microsoft is continuing its commitment to delivering open technologies and contributing to and partnering with the open source community.

New tools and partnerships are designed to help developers build intelligent, enterprise-ready and cloud-scale apps — regardless of their platform, and to give them the peace of mind with the built-in security, performance, compliance, support and SLAs available in Azure.

Azure Databricks Preview

Designed in collaboration with the founders of Apache® Spark™, Azure Databricks is a fast, easy and collaborative Apache® Spark™-based analytics platform that delivers one-click set up, streamlined workflows, and an interactive workspace.

Native integration with Azure SQL Data Warehouse, Azure Storage, Azure Cosmos DB, Azure Active Directory and Power BI, simplifies the creation of modern data warehouses that enable organizations to provide self-service analytics over all data with enterprise-grade performance and governance.

Cassandra API preview for Azure Cosmos DB

Expands on the multi-model capabilities of Azure Cosmos DB to offer Cassandra as-a-service over turnkey global distribution, multiple consistency levels and industry-leading SLAs.

GitHub Roadmap for Git Virtual File Systems (GVFS)

GitHub will announce GVSF adoption and roadmap for GVSF integration making GVSF the open source industry standard for enterprise scale Git Repositories.

Microsoft Joins MariaDB Foundation

Microsoft joins MariaDB foundation as platinum member and announces upcoming preview of Azure Database for MariaDB for a fully managed MariaDB service in the cloud.

Helping developers get more done

Microsoft is releasing tools designed to help developers, developer teams, data scientists and business decision makers, collaborate and work together more efficiently for application development, deployment and management.

New tools and feature improvements help to streamline essential tasks, so developers can focus more on getting apps to market across multiple platforms, andfor any scenario — whether cloud, data or AI.

Visual Studio App Center GA

New cloud service for developers to ship higher quality applications more frequently. Objective-C, Swift, Android Java, Xamarin and React Native developers can use App Center to increase productivity and accelerate application lifecycle, freeing them to spend more time on new features and better user experiences.

Visual Studio Live Share

Unique new capability for developers to collaborate in a seamless and secure way with full project context. Developers can share projects with teammates, or other developers, to edit and debug the same code in their personalized editor or IDE.

Azure DevOps Projects

Lets developers configure a full DevOps pipeline and connect to Azure Services in less than 5 minutes for faster app development and deployment.

With just a few clicks in the Azure portal developers can setup Git repositories, wire up completely automated build & release pipelines without any prior knowledge of how to do so.

Transforming business through analytics and AI

Advances in artificial intelligence and machine learning are placing the seemingly impossible within reach. New tools and APIs from Microsoft are designed to help developers create apps that harness analytics in the cloud and data on the network’s edge, empowering business with new capabilities.

Azure IoT Edge

Azure IoT Edge preview availability, enabling artificial intelligence, advanced analytics and machine learning at the Internet of Things (IoT) edge.

Visual Studio Tools for AI

Developers and data scientists can develop AI models with all the productivity of Visual Studio, on any framework and language. Updates to .NET make it easier for .NET developers to consume AI models from their applications.

Azure SQL Database Machine Learning services preview

Support for R models inside SQL Databasemakes it seamless for data scientists to develop and train models in Azure Machine Learning and deploy those models directly to Azure SQL Database to create predictions at blazing-fast speeds.

For the next two days, Microsoft is streaming more than 36 live, engineering-led training sessions that are designed to give developers hands-on experience with the tools and technologies featured throughout the keynote presentations

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5 Most Technologically Advanced Countries in Africa

Don’t be surprised by the title, there are in fact a number of technologically advanced countries in Africa.

To add to the continent’s abundant natural and human resources, there are now countries in the continent with inventors or entrepreneurs who are blazing the trail in the field of science and technology.

Jumia Travel, the leading online travel agency, shares 5 of these technologically advanced countries in Africa.

South Africa

With some of the best universities in Africa and the world as well as many awesome infrastructures, South Africa is one of the most technologically advanced countries in Africa according to the current global innovation index (GII).

Uganda

Uganda is another country in Africa with advanced technological and innovation capabilities. In recent times, the Ugandan government has invested heavily in its ICT sector and has worked to attract more foreign investors into the sector. One significant technological feat of Uganda is that in 2016, Uganda launched Africa’s first ever solar-powered bus, ‘Kayoola’.

Nigeria

This is Africa’s most populous country and is another country in Africa that has recorded notable strides in technological advancements. Nigeria has its very own tech hub or, if you want to make comparisons, ‘Silicon Valley’, in Yaba, an area in Lagos state (one of the 36 states of the nation considered the commercial and business nerve center of the country). The area recently played host to Facebook Founder, Mark Zuckerberg, and is the home of successful technology companies like Andela (that has now moved to a nearby area called ‘Ikorodu Road’), Co-Creation Hub etc.

Kenya

Many start-up companies (especially in the field of information technology) with great and revolutionary ideas are emerging from Kenya. Some of Kenya’s notable innovations include Anthony Mutua’s charging shoe, an alarm-fitted television, an SMS car immobilizer, solar powered refrigerators and underwater pet housing.

Egypt

Many experts agree that civilization started in Egypt, and the country has long been associated with innovations and inventions. Despite some of the civil unrest in Egypt, the country has remained a force to be reckoned with in the area of technology. Many universities in the country have supported most of the nation’s technological advancements

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Nigeria to review cybercrime policy

On Tuesday 31 October 2017, the Senate Committee on ICT and Cybercrime in Nigeria revealed that they believe that the current law on cybercrime in the country needs to be reviewed to meet the standard of that in developed countries. Abdulfatai Buhari, chairman of the committee, Oyo-APC, made the statement while addressing the press at a briefing.

The briefing, he noted, was to invite journalists and members of the public to a three-day conference on ICT and cyber-crime, which is set take place between the 6th and 9th of November 2017.

Buhari revealed that the conference will play an important role in effecting a review of the Cyber-crime Act. “If you remember, in March 2015 the former President signed a bill on cybercrime but when you look at the bill, it is very scanty. So, we came up with a bill which has passed through first reading,” he said.

“Our intention is that if you take the bill for second reading without the input of experts, you are just wasting your time. We need to study how other countries are implementing their cybercrime law. Most people don’t even know that we have a cybercrime law in this country. That’s one of the reasons for this conference. We want to gather every knowledge so as to prepare the bill for the second reading. By the time we are coming for the public hearing, the bill will be so rich and we’ll have something to fall back on.”

Buhari further stated that the cybercrime bill should be reviewed in order to prepare the country for impending dangers. He pointed out the spate of cybercrimes globally which brings into question the safety of Nigeria’s cyberspace. “We discussed a motion and we decided that we don’t have to fold our arms and wait until there is an attack before we act. We decided to take a preventive measure. If the developed world is been attacked day in day out, there is a need for us to strengthen our cyberspace.

“In Germany, there is a ministry entirely dedicated to cybercrime, the same thing in USA. Last year alone, the British government budgeted four billion pounds to fight cybercrime because they know the implication.”

The chairman pointed out holes in the current cybercrime act by claiming that there is no definition of who handles cybercrime and that there is no solid law (on cybercrime) in Nigeria. “The moment a database is attacked, God forbid, the country is doomed,” concluded Buhari.

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